


Callisto

by singtome



Series: Hard Rock [2]
Category: The Maze Runner (Movies), The Maze Runner Series - James Dashner
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dystopia, Background Jeff/Winston, Background Sonya/Harriet - Freeform, Chronic Illness, Friends to Lovers, Graphic descriptions of violence, Heavy Angst, Heavy Found Family Tropes, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Inappropriate sexual activity in a cornfield, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-11
Updated: 2019-09-11
Packaged: 2020-10-14 09:16:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 74,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20598368
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/singtome/pseuds/singtome
Summary: There are billions of atoms that have collided; an immeasurable supply of matter that has joined together to create the cosmos that they, themselves, live in. The universe is vast, cold wasteland of unforgiving beauty and, somehow and some way, they have managed to exist in it at the same time.(Or: Hundreds of years ago, a boy who will one day be called Newt waits at the gate for WCKD to open it's doors.)





	1. The Callisto Project

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've come here from part one, hello! If you're here not having read part one of this series, I urge you to do so before reading this one. However, if you'd like to experience this story in chronological order then you are in the right place. 
> 
> (I do suggest you tackle Hard Rock before Callisto, though. But I guess I'm not your mother, either, so with that being said do as you wish.) 
> 
> To summarise: Jamie, Amanda, Snick and Dreams - you guys are the real MVPs. Thank you for supporting me through this long (long) journey. I hope you enjoy the conclusion.

___

_non est ad astra mollis e terris via _

_(There is no easy way from the earth to the stars) _

_\- Seneca_

_\- _

He sees the boy that will one day be known as Thomas for the first time standing in line at the convention centre. With a blank expression and eyes trained ahead, unblinking, for a long moment the boy who will one day be known as Newt thinks he fell asleep on his feet.

Even in such a large, open venue people cram into it like sardines in a metal tin, rocking back and forward on their feet, no doubt tired of standing in the one place for hours and making little to no progress in moving forward, the impatience and agitation tickling their bones beneath the skin. Newt felt that very same thing sink its claws into him three two hours prior, when Minho had squeezed his elbow and said_ I’m going to find the bathroom_ and left him to mind their spot in line completely alone, Newt’s arguments going unheard.

The boy’s eyes snap open. He is fifty feet away from Newt at least, but he can still make out the way his lips curl in irritation as he shakes out his wrists and cracks his neck, and without thinking, Newt mimics the gesture, his joints sighing in relief. The clock glaring down at everyone like an omniscient god changes with a high chime, tells them all that it is now 4 pm, and Newt that he has been standing in this room for a record nine hours – nine hours of numb feet where he stands and a sore ass when he sits, smelling the body odour and piss which engulfs the room like a gas heater.

With nothing much better to do, Newt’s gaze finds the boy again. He is rubbing his eyes with the heels of his palms, shoulders tense and hunched with fatigue. Newt wonders how long he has been here. He is further back in the line than Newt, but not by much, meaning he could have arrived thirty minutes to an hour later than him and Minho.

A man bumps Newt’s back, causing him to stumble forward. He snarls something rude at him, yellow teeth bared, and Newt, stupid and impulsive, flips him off. The man’s lip curls dangerously, eyes narrowing, but thankfully he seems to be too tired to give a shit about engaging. Newt sighs, hunching further into his jacket.

The line, slow and steady, shuffles forward.

The must have let another round inside. The inches forward that he has taken, though small and snail-paced as they are, feels like a small miracle. 

Newt’s eyes instinctively scan the crowd, as they do on and off every ten minutes, on the clock. Still no sign of Minho, and to top it all off; in the excitement he’s lost sight of the boy. There is a flash of brown hair and the corner of a worn sleeve for just a moment before the crowd shits, and they are gone again. Newt sighs. Where is Minho? He wishes he told him to grab some food on his travels, and hoping Minho has half the sense to do so anyway.

Newt presses a hand against his stomach and grimaces. It’s easier to ignore the fact that the most he’s eaten in the past three days are a couple of bread slices and one ill-advised raisin, if he doesn’t think about it. The money and resources to get here took them nearly two weeks to scrounge up, he and Minho _combined_. Therefore, some sacrifices had to be made for the greater good.

_Their_ greater good, to clarify. If, that is, they are chosen to participate in the Program. And the Program, well. He supposes it’s good; in the sense of an astronomical, utopian wet dream for a dying race and a faster dying planet.

The clock above their heads chimes once more. A new round of applicants have been taken in, and everyone shuffles forward. From above they would resemble a large brown and dusty wave, undulating jagged and sluggish. Newt makes it a foot further until he feels the toe of his boot hit the back of the woman’s heel in front of him.

He closes his eyes and rests.

It is going to be a long wait.

The boy who will one day be known as Minho returns sometime later with a handful of granola bars he picked up from god knows where, and a crooked grin. Newt takes the ones he is offered and decides to chew him out after he’s inhaled at least two, however, second wrapper crumpled in his fist and growling stomach sated for the time being, he feels his mood simmer. When he asks Minho where he has been, his friend squares his shoulders and immediately slips into defence mode, which is never a good start. Newt pre-emptively groans. 

“Alright, look, before you get mad,” Minho begins, not a good start at all, “I was trying to find a way for us to move up the line.”

Newt stares. “Okay. How?”

Minho digs his fists into the pockets of the too big bomber he stole off some junkie passed out in an alleyway back when they were swindling their way through California last year, chin tilting and eyes brightening like he knows Newt is going to like this story. Newt thinks Minho should learn not to count his chickens too early. “On the way back ran into some girl who works inside – hey, shut up and let me finish – she said,” Minho drops his voice into a whisper and leans in closer, “She said that they’re letting anyone who’s 18 to 21 straight through at the door. Less likely to be sick, you know? Also, you see those guards?”

Newt turns to where Minho is pointing. He sees the men patrolling the crowd; guards for WCKD, or, as Newt and Minho are particularly privy to calling them, _grievers_, as the way that they stare at you, cold and lifeless, feel as if they are already making plans for your funeral. It’s a little hard to miss them: red and black armour, covered head to toe, faces concealed by flat masks that give a certain alien edge to their already extraneous guise, and the very large launchers in their hands, swaying as they walk. The real mystery behind them, however, is no one knows if there are actual humans under there or not.

“Okay, well, apparently they’re scanning for potential applicants through,” Minho says, “Crowd’s too big to wait until everyone here is at the door to let another round in. People in there have homes and families, right?”

He says that last part with a twisted mouth and narrowed eyes. Newt leans closer until their shoulders touch.

Minho continues, “Anyway. If you were already on the registry they’d have all your details, and that’s what they’re doing – going around the crowd looking for anyone they have on the list telling them they’re 21.”

Newt shakes his head, waiting for Minho to get to the point. “Okay, good for them. Why are you telling me all this?”

Minho bumps his shoulder back and grins, leaning in close until most of his chest is pressed against Newt’s side. Personal space is not a concept that exists in Minho’s orbit. “Because I gave her our numbers to pass on to the folks upfront. If all goes well we’ll be plucked out ages before we get to the doors.”

Newt feels light-headed. “You gave them our _numbers?_” he demands, hand unconsciously moving to the six-digits on his shoulder protectively, feeling the familiar nausea of panic wash over him. Minho notices and shifts into damage control.

“Relax, hey,” Minho grips Newt’s shoulders firmly, “There’s nothing to worry about. Look at me.” Newt looks at him. “When we get chosen for the program they’re going to have them anyway, remember? This is just speeding up the process.”

Inside, he knows Minho is right; that he’s being idiotic for freaking out over the concept of a stranger holding his and Minho’s numbers in her grasp, for her to do with whatever she wishes.

“You’re right,” Newt says, taking a deep, shaky breath. “You – yeah. They’re going to have them anyway if we go in.”

“_When_ we go in,” Minho says, giving Newt a little shake, “When.”

“When,” Newt repeats, smiling a little.

They eat their last granola bar slowly, taking bites in turns, and afterward, Minho launches into a story that Newt only half listens to in the beginning and then not at all when the crowd shifts as another round are let in, exposing the boy again. He is closer than he was before, the crowd pushing them closer together the further up they travel. At this distance, Newt can see that everything about him looks sun-bleached, from his clothes to his hair to the deep tan of his skin. Freckles cover his nose and cheeks, and his lips barely move as he talks softly to the girl standing next to him. Newt stares without meaning to.

They must have travelled over from the west, maybe Los Angeles or some desert settlement, if not the city. Definitely not the streets, judging from the patchwork amendments made to their clothing. The girl – long dark hair that might have been pretty if the opportunity to wash all the dust out of it presented itself – stands up on her toes to whisper something in her companion’s ear. Her face disappears for just a moment but when it returns she is smirking, and then the boy is looking right at Newt.

Newt had learnt at a very young age that is it quite easy to disappear in a large crowd, but now he finds it impossible.

Minho, of course, notices the shift immediately. “What is it? What’s up?” he asks, eyes roving their immediate surroundings like a guard dog.

Newt cringes, feeling his cheeks heat, and says, “Nothing. It’s fine.”

Minho is unconvinced. Five plus years of being friends and travelling together has left them strangely in tune with one another. If one is tense the other is tense. If Minho is worried Newt is worried. If Newt is worried Minho is _very _worried. He looks around the room, “No really, what –?”

He’s turned toward the two strangers enough to make direct contact, and Newt swivels him back around before that can happen, narrowly avoiding elbowing the man beside them in the ribs. “Everything’s fine!” he hisses, “I’m just tired. I’m sick of standing here.”

It isn’t a complete lie. So far it has been nine and a half hours and counting. Good thing almost a decade on the street has taught him the art of patience.

Minho’s cautious eyes turn sympathetic. “I know, man, me too,” he says. “Won’t be much longer. Promise.”

Five hours pass. The sun has set long ago and men and women begin to unroll their bags to settle in for the night. Newt’s legs feel like wrought steal, his feet like hot irons. With eyes that are heavy and unfocussed, he wants nothing more than to unroll his bag and do the same. He and Minho decide to sleep in shifts, not less different than they do usually; the street more than the desert, where as in the desert the only fear is fighting off wild animals who would only maim or kill them, while a human could do much worse.

They wake the other when the line has begun to move, if the chime of the clock does not do it first, or simply drag them forward if they fail to wake up at all.

Now, Minho sleeps curled at Newt’s hip as he sits on the cold floor with his knees to his chest. The lights have long since dimmed into a murky orange sheen, which is nice of them to do. Newt can guess that the tests will run smoother if applicants don’t arrive already exhausted beyond all belief. Newt yawns involuntarily, which turns into a cough. He glances down at Minho when he feels him move at his side but thankfully stays sleep. Newt takes to pinching his ankle every two minutes to stop it from happening again.

Though, if a simple cough were enough to wake Minho, then he would have no hope in this room. It’s far from silent; the white noise from the guard’s coms and the accompanied beeping is loud as they pass. Then there is the chime of the clock, the heavy _hiss! _of the doors as they let another round inside, and not to mention to noises coming from every single human being in the room. Loud, fidgety and irritable, everyone coughs or sneezes or wheezes of talks or snores without a moment's grace. Newt blocks them out as best as someone who has spent years fine-tuning his ears to alert at the slightest sound – the wail of a distant siren, the soft click of shoes against the floor, anything that could mean that they will have to get up and run – can.

He listens to Minho micro-sleep and feels him twitch against his side as he counts the seconds, over and over again. Whenever a guard comes a little closer to them than one came last time Newt feels his heartbeat quicken until they turn away. One, some feet away and in front, leans down to check the number of a family bundled together under a mountain of dirty cloth and bags used for pillows. The guard peels down the neck of the little girl’s shirt to scan her number, and Newt watches as the mother tenses, pulling her child closer while the father squares his shoulders, subtle, not to draw attention but enough so that he would be ready, just in case.

It’s a familiar set of mannerisms that send a pang to Newt’s heart, which he immediately smothers down.

The guard moves on to the woman next, scanning her number and then the man before moving on. That done with, and as if nothing ever happened, the man and woman fold themselves over and around their child like a two rose petals closing up after the sun has gone. 

The clock chimes and startles them both, Minho jerking in his sleep. Newt’s hand is on his arm to steady him in an instant, mouth forming around the words, _It’s not your round yet, go back to sleep_ when he hears a whisper, and Newt turns to find the boy and girl from before sitting some ways away, hunched in with their heads together, talking quietly.

Newt raises an eyebrow. _They just keep moving closer, don’t they?_ He guesses it is somewhat inevitable, what with the Hourly Shuffle, and all. Newt glances back toward the end of the queue, looking to the past where he and Minho had stood hours before, and the small amount of distance makes him want to weep.

The two strangers are close enough that Newt could just raise his voice a tiny bit above a whisper and they would hear him.

Newt checks the time. Another five minutes and he will have to wake Minho for his shift, and while his eyes are near burning and he would love nothing more than to collapse his exhausted body to the cold floor beneath them, he figures Minho wouldn’t mind at least another ten minutes of sleep.

Newt clears his throat and, as loud as he dears, calls out, “Hey.”

Their heads snap over to him in an instant. Quick. Simultaneously. It would have been unsettling if Newt didn’t relate so much.

Tucking his left ankle under his right knee, Newt turns his body more toward the two in what he hopes comes off as a friendly and harmless, and asks, “So how long have you guys been here?”

It takes them all of a minute to answer, long enough that Newt had begun to think they wouldn’t do so at all, but simply stare at him all night until he grabbed Minho and shuffled them over a good ten people, away from their steely glares. But, in the end, it’s the girl who says, “Eleven,” and tacks on, “hours,” at the end as if Newt would have mistaken the number for _Days_. 

Honestly, it wouldn’t surprise him. He shudders to think how long the people up the front have been in line.

“Fourteen,” Newt says in return, “Nearly fifteen.”

The girl offers a sympathetic wince and the boy whistles and says, “Damn.”

Newt picks at a hole in his sleeve, working it bigger. He imagines a frown in the back of his mind, and a voice saying _Keep destroying everything that’s yours and wait to see how unforgiving the winter is _and stops. “

Newt hears, “Are you on the registry?” and looks up, blinking out of his thoughts. The question came from the boy, who waits patiently for an answer.

He has no idea how long he had been swimming around in his own thoughts but it must have been a good while, as now the girl has her head on her friend’s knee, using it as a pillow, body curled around him. The overseeing God tells them it is 21:58 and in two minutes it will chime again and Minho will launch up from his nap and complain that Newt didn’t wake him.

“No,” Newt says, finally. “Are you?” He shakes his head. “Well, looks like we’re both in for the long haul,” Newt says, thinking about Minho giving out their numbers to a stranger.

His hand reaches up subconsciously to trace over the familiar spot beneath his clothes. He can almost feel the raised surface beneath his fingers.

He had been on the registry once, but that would have been a very long time ago. Well, he assumes he would have been, anyway. Everyone born in a hospital is automatically put on file before they realise they’ve been born. Newt’s face, name and number are probably floating around on some old, outdated database somewhere, back before the new world order took over. Back when the system did more good than it did bad.

The perks of being unregistered in this world were this: he would do what he wanted when he wanted, and go anywhere in the world and no one knew who he was.

The cons were this: no one knew who he was. A person unregistered was no one.

Well. That is going to change in a short while, he supposes.

The boy turns into his collar and begins to cough. It lasts a good minute; short, barking coughs that catch in his throat like he is trying to keep them down. It feels strangely voyeuristic to watch, as if he should look away until he is done, and come back like nothing happened. But the dust is everywhere; in your hair, on your clothes, and in your lungs, and no one can help that.

His eyes are red and puffy when he finally stops, sending Newt a sheepish grin as if to say _Sorry about that, where were we? _Newt shakes his head and dares to shuffle closer without disturbing Minho or the other strangers beside them. He says, “Do you have water?”

The boy looks around briefly, patting some bags down, before shaking his head, “No, sorry, we must have used it all up before.”

Newt can’t help the smile pulling at the corners of his mouth. “No,” he says, “No, I was offering _you_ water.”

His eyes widen, embarrassed. “Oh. Uh.”

“We have some if you want it.”

“Yeah. Please. Thank you.”

Newt shuffles closer to bridge the gap, and the boy does the same. At the exact moment that the water bottle hits the air the loud chime of the clock yells out through the room, and Minho shoots up from the floor the second it lands in the boy’s hands.

Minho squints around the room, bleary and confused. Around them people moan and groan, some already falling back asleep. Minho notices the time, looks at Newt and frowns, “I told you to wake me up.” And then, toward the boy, and their distinct bottle clutched in his hands, and frowns, “And what did I tell you about making friends while I’m away?”

The boy bristles, capping the bottle and sliding it back. Newt is unsure if he actually took a drink or not, “Sorry. Hi.”

“Hi.” Minho takes the bottle back dubiously, “Who are you?”

His friend is also sitting upright, and the boy introduces himself not as, “Thomas.” And also doesn’t say, “This is Teresa.”

She blinks around the room, offers a small wave and immediately puts her head back on his shoulder and closes her eyes, curling up against his arm, comfortably.

Minho scratches his scalp, sending his hair flying everywhere. “Sure. I’m Minho, this is Newt. Have we been called yet?”

Newt shakes his head, turning his eyes away from the pair. Minho swears. “We’re going to be here for days,” he moans. Newt knows what he’s thinking; that the girl never gave the people upfront their numbers, which she probably forgot them the second Minho walked away, or that she simply didn’t care. She works for WCKD, the company who runs the Program and half the world, she is registered and getting paid the idealistic sum every week. She has a house and a family and food on a dining room table every night, why would she take mercy on two kids with no names.

Newt sighs and turns to find Thomas still looking at them. His gaze averts when he sees that Newt has noticed, and Newt thinks, _well_. Looks like that little interlude is finished up with. Just as he is setting himself up for a night of a growling stomach and fitful sleep, the heavy, steel-toed boot of a griever lands inches from his ankle. He snatches it back, startled. His bones turn to stone when the guard kneels down to eye level, gun pointed precariously to the side, and he demands in his deep, metallic voice, “_Identification Please.”_

Minho’s fingers curl around Newt’s wrist, tight. Newt tries to keep his voice as even as possible when he answers, “We don’t have any.”

The griever’s face is a smooth, black surface, but Newt can’t help but think he looks annoyed. “_Very Well. Number Please_.”

Newt’s stomach turns over itself. Minho pressed in close at his back is, right now, the only thing stopping him from hurling into a complete panic. A moment passes, and when Newt does nothing the guard leans back on the heels of his feet, the gun twitching ever closer to them.

“_Number Please. Now.”_

Newt feels frozen. People have turned toward the commotion, Thomas and Teresa included, and they watch him with quiet, tense worry on their brows.

Minho speaks up before things can escalate. “Look, here. Have mine,” he says, and Newt turns to find his pulling down the neck of his shirt to expose his shoulder and reveal the small, six-digit number on his bicep. 

The griever wastes no time in scanning the code, and when the crisp green light washes over Minho’s skin, Newt feels his friend’s involuntary wince. This is it. There’s no going back now.

The griever rattles off intimate details including Minho’s name, height, weight and age, and life expectancy (fifty-five average) which makes them both pale. Minho slowly rights his clothes with a rattled expression, and Newt can only imagine the kind of thoughts that are running rampant beneath the surface. The griever turns to Newt next, expectantly, and Newt takes a deep breath and closes his eyes before pulling down his sleeve. He jerks involuntarily when the ghostly sting of the light washes over his skin, and finds out that he is expected to last one year less than Minho.

The griever stands tall, pulling the gun to his chest and bellowing down.

“_You Have Been Selected For Initial Trials. Please Come With Me._”

Newt’s mouth goes dry. Around them, people begin to grumble under their breaths, rude and jealous snipes towards the two of them. Newt sits up, “Uh,” he croaks, “Both of us?”

“_Yes_.” The guard says.

They stand. Minho’s hand is still locked around Newt’s wrist, tight enough that if he were to let go white imprints would remain in its place. They do this when they’re raiding buildings for supplies or are in any sort of unfamiliar territory, where the chance of being separated and losing the other is high. The griever turns to walk and Minho moves to follow him, but something makes Newt hesitate. A chance of a look down catches Thomas’ eyes. He is watching them with awe but with an edge of disappointment swimming just beneath. His lips twitch into a tentative smile and he mouths the words, _Good luck_, and Newt finds himself speaking. 

“They’re with us,” he says, surprised at his own words. The griever turns and stares at Newt blankly, as does Minho, but a second later he catches up.

“Yeah, they’re with us.” Minho says, “Aren’t you going to check them, too?”

Green light washes over Teresa and Thomas’ stunned faces in a flash, and they both flinch. The guard says, “_They Do Not Appear To Be On The Registry_.”

Newt digs his heels. “Neither are we. Scan them,” he says, not glancing down to check if this is okay.

The guard eventually scans them, and a minute later Thomas and Teresa stand beside Newt and Minho, stunned and a little dazed. Thomas gives Newt a smile, and Newt gives him one back. The four of them walk through the gates and into the building beyond.

The words _THE_ _CALLISTO PROJECT_ shines bright and blinding.

-

Newt wakes to the sound of the radio, a light head, and a sore throat. The lights shining bright above him sting his sensitive eyes, and his body feels stiff yet boneless as if someone has come in and unwound all of his strings, like a puppet. Newt groans, immediately wincing at the sharp pain it brings and lifts a heavy hand to shield his face from the lights, wishing someone would turn them down. His wrist snags on something halfway over, and Newt turns his face – head, lolling to the side, eyes struggling to focus – to find it tangled around a hospital cord.

After a few experimental tugs, Newt concludes that his wrist is still, amazingly, caught, and tries again harder. This is when he hears the voice in the bed beside his and realises, _oh_, he is not alone in the room.

“Careful. If you rip that out it’ll hurt. Trust me.”

Newt frowns. Hurt? Why – Oh. The cord is attached to a needle sticking out of the top of his hand.

Alright, fair enough.

Like a drunk, Newt reaches an arm out for the small water cup by his bed, just out of reach. He hears a sigh, and then the creek of a bed shifting, and suddenly the table is being rolled toward him. Newt drains the entire cup gratefully even though he knows he probably shouldn’t, and lies back against the pillows until his head clears, and his vision sharpens. His hearing takes a little while longer.

The radio is playing a soft tune he does not recognise, shortly followed by the cheery yammer of a DJ. It must be an old recording. Nothing like that has been broadcasted live for years.

The radio host’s smooth drawl leads them into a new melody, a slow, rhythmic guitar and drums combo that only makes him want to fall back asleep. He’d almost forgotten the person beside him until she speaks again, in a voice Newt now realises is familiar.

“By the way,” Teresa says, reclined back on her bed, flipping a page of her book, “You snore. Really loud. If I were you I would ask someone to take a look at that while you’re here.”

She settles him with a weary, irritated side-eye and Newt flushes.

“Sorry,” he says. The gravel is his voice makes him flinch. Teresa shrugs one shoulder and turns another page.

“Good that you’re awake, though,” she says. “How do you feel?”

Newt thinks long and hard for a good minute before giving up and answering, honestly, “Like I’ve been sat on by five burgs.”

This earns a small laugh from Teresa.

“Specific. And dramatic, but it’s normal.”

She puts her book down and turns in her bed until she is facing him, chin resting on her palm, elbow on the pillow. “You’ll feel pretty bad for a few hours after you wake up. Maybe a day. It’s different for everyone, they told me.”

The corner of Teresa’s hospital gown slips down over her shoulder and exposes one small corner of a black digit. She rights it pretty fast, but not quick enough for Newt to not have seen the small **_5_**. He averts his gaze and pretends he hadn’t.

“How long have you been awake?”

“I woke up Tuesday afternoon,” Teresa says, “Felt pretty bad the first few hours, like you, but then it got a lot easier. They even let me walk around the room this morning.” She says the last part with a little sarcastic wave of her hands. Newt smirks, but then she says, “It’s now Thursday if you were wondering. 3:15 pm. May 25th.”

_May 25th …_

They have been here for two weeks. Two weeks since they were lead through the doors, and two weeks since the initial testing began, to conclude if they were truly a match for the Program. Two weeks since the trails actually began, and since he’s seen Minho.

Restlessness creeps in like a sickness under Newt’s skin. He hasn’t stayed more than a few days in one place in a long time. The concept itself makes him feel uneasy.

Teresa seems to sense his internal turmoil and remarks, “You don’t like to sit still for too long, do you?”

Newt sits up a little higher, “I’m a live-out-of-the-suitcase kind of guy.”

Teresa chews on her lip and sits up herself. Smoothing the fabric of the gown over her knee, she says, “I get it. Where Tom and I lived before we used to get people coming in and out. They would stay for about a week, maybe longer, but never more than three. You’d see them get restless, start to look over their shoulders at every corner. You would wake up some mornings and there would be another empty bed.”

She shrugs and looks up at Newt. Her hair is tied to the side, tamer than the last time he had seen it. Newt guesses a couple weeks out of the harsh sun would help that a lot. He touches his own hair, and it feels a bit less like straw lightly dipped in mud.

“You’re safe here,” Teresa tells him, “We all are. Newt – it was Newt, right? Okay – you’ve been accepted into the Donor Program. _The Donor Program_. Has it sunk in yet? Took a bit for me.”

And. It does take a moment just as she said, but then suddenly her words are hitting home and Newt allows them to buzz around his brain for a minute, replaying them over and over and _You’ve been picked for the Donor Program, Newt._

Newt flops back down onto the pillows, dizzy again, a breathless laugh escaping his lips. He hears Teresa’s smile in her voice when she says, “There it is.”

The Donor Program, also known as the Callisto Project, is humanities last-ditch effort to save the human race. Last-ditch because there is absolutely no other option. The planet – formally known as Earth, now simply exists as one large floating ball in space that the occupants left on it call Hard Rock – is dying. Or, has been dying, or has already died, no one really knows for sure. The funny thing about the end of the world is you don’t really know when it’s going to happen, just as you won’t know it has ended until it’s gone and done so.

The Callisto Project is more of a long term plan than anything. For months Newt and Minho have been traveling across states, seeing flyer and billboards and advertisements upon adverts from WCKD talking about some saviour. Newt thought it was just a Christ-risen-again scenario and dismissed it for the longest time until one night. It had been raining, and he and Minho had gotten caught stealing food and other goods to sell from some five-story mansion when, in haste to get away, Newt slipped and fell on wet pavement and cracked his head against the hard stone.

He woke to Minho’s distressed cries of his name and a beam of light above them, and at first he thought, _This is it. This is the end of the line for us. We’re finally going to be separated and put away, no way to escape forever and ever and ever. _Until his vision cleared and he saw what it really was – a hover sign, cheerfully detailing in bright blue on white:

**JOIN THE CALLISTO PROJECT. DO YOUR PART AND BECOME A DONOR TODAY!**

Applicants, if they were successful, would obviously be rewarded for the gurgling two weeks of the donation process. _Handsomely_. The promise was a lifetime of comfort, funded entirely by WCKD. They would live in some fancy home out in the desert, would never have to scavenge food another day in their lives. All for giving their DNA to the Project.

DNA and more. Newt isn’t entirely sure of everything that they took from him, but he knows the list includes, of course, his core DNA, red and white blood cells, blood and bone marrow, cell samples, saliva, plasma, sperm – every little thing that makes up Newt. He had been mostly unconscious the entire process time, waking up every day or so just so that they could monitor his vitals, and make sure everything wasn’t getting too much.

It took him three months to convince Minho that this was a good idea. And now here they are.

Newt covers his face with his hands and laughs, a little hysterical.

The plan was someday, in hundreds of years, the human race will carry on elsewhere. Newt will never live to see that day, but he will never have to live this one running to survive another day, ever again.

The nurse that has come to check on them frowns at the volume the music has risen too. Before, a giddy and delirious Newt had told Teresa to turn the radio up, which she did. Now, it blares through their room in a soft and dreamy tenor some would describe as old-timey, washing over them as they lounge in their respective beds. Newt, waiting to feel like a person again with Teresa indulging him through it.

The nurse clicks her tongue and turns the dial to a soft thrum, politely informing them that patients are still recovering in the next rooms, and would very much need the peace and quiet.

As the woman checks on Newt, Teresa asks, “Can I see him yet?” with an impatient, sharp edge to her voice that makes him look up in surprise.

The nurse looks at Teresa with a pitying smile, and Newt can almost hear the _Bless your soul_ resting at the back of her tongue when she says, “Not yet, dear, sorry. I’m afraid he’s still asleep.”

“It’s been three days,” Teresa says.

“I know, dear, but –”

“I just want to see him. I’m not going to try and wake him, or whatever you’re thinking. I just need to make sure he’s okay.”

The nurse cocks her hip and hugs Newt’s chart to her chest. “Thomas is fine, dear. He is in the safest of hands, don’t you worry. Kids in his condition just take that little bit longer to recover, that’s all. Don’t worry,” she says, “The second he’s conscious I’ll come right by and get you. How’s that sound?”

Teresa doesn’t look happy, but a compromise is a compromise, so she nods her head regardless. The nurse smiles. She checks on Newt once more, fluffs his pillows and changes his blankets before giving them both a fresh jug of water. Lastly, she tells them that _Supper will be delivered in just an hour _before leaving.

The room is quiet for a long time after that.

Newt falls into an inky, fitful sleep and wakes up from a nightmare that leaves him gasping, shooting up from the bed and probably scaring Teresa, despite her remaining in her bed, back to him. It takes him a whole hour and twenty minutes to fall back asleep, and the next time he wakes it is light again. There is also a doctor at his feet, one of Newt’s ankles held tight in his cold hands.

Newt starts and tries to pull away but the doctor sees his distress and - instead of letting so, as would be assumed - tightens his hold and shushes him quietly.

“Easy there, it’s just me,” he says as if Newt should have any idea who this man is. “Just taking a look. Has your leg always been like this?”

Newt presses his lips and clenches his fist, fighting against the _Don’t touch me_ crawling its way across his tongue like a spider. The answer to that question is both yes and no. Instead of answering either of them, Newt lifts his chin in defiance and asks, “Where’s Minho?”

The doctor appears confused for a brief moment before he quickly recovers, and says, “He’s in room twenty-seven. Did you break your ankle when you were young, Newt?”

The man’s name tag reads Dr. Janson, and he will later encourage Newt to call him David. Newt does not.

“Can I see him?” Newt asks.

“I’m afraid he’s still asleep,” Janson says, “And you have another few hours until you can walk around.”

Newt sighs. “I broke it when I was eight,” he admits in a mutter.

“How?” Newt doesn’t answer this. Jason moves on, “It’s hurt ever since?” Newt nods. “It wasn’t set right, that’s why. We can probably fix that.”

Later that evening they take Newt into another room and fix his ankle. He feels nothing at all, and the sensation is so strange that Newt doesn’t believe they actually did anything until the next day when he is allowed to stand for the first time, helped by two nurses, and the absence of pain like electricity shooting up his leg startles him almost to his knees. Teresa is subject to watching him hop around the room on one foot like a lunatic. They fix his nose, too, aligning the septum, and later he will see Minho and Minho will proceed to tease him about getting a nose job while he waits for it to heal.

Teresa is allowed to walk around on her own now, and Newt watches with envy every time she comes and goes from their room as she pleases. Where she goes, he has no idea, but he has a strong suspicion that she’s trying to break into Thomas’ room. Teresa’s pretty good company when she stays put; more often than not they find themselves cross-legged on their beds, chatting, playing word games and sharing past experiences. Some of them made up, and it’s the other person’s job to figure out which story is false. When Newt is allowed to walk around on his own they take trips around the facility together.

They’re allowed to slip into the courtyard for sunlight and oxygen, but quickly discover their favourite place to sit is in front of a floor to ceiling window that spans an entire wall past the cafeteria, toward the east wing. It overlooks the horizon where the desert meets the sea, and every day like clockwork they will find each other at the window to watch the sunset.

The sun glimmering off the surface of the water looks like a thousand crystals, and Newt can’t help but wonder if this is what the new world will be like. Sometimes he is sad that he’ll never get to see it.

They also make an effort to _just by chance_ stroll past Minho and Thomas’ room, one keeping watch while the other stands on their toes to peek through the small porthole in the door. Newt learns Minho is still sound asleep this way because hell if the doctors will actually tell him anything beyond vague one-liners. He went under a few days after Newt (this one thing they have told him). Newt looks at him now – one arm flopped over the side of the bed and mouth hanging open, waiting to watch flies, and can’t help but laugh.

Teresa is less casual; peeking in at Thomas with this deep frown set into her face. It’s almost as if she’s worried he might not wake up at all. Newt is too scared to ask if that’s actually an option.

Her frown depends and grows to almost permanent status when Minho wakes before Thomas. When Janson comes to fetch Newt and take him to see his friend, something inside Newt curdles with guilt at the thought of leaving her on her own, so he turns at the door and asks, “Do you want to come with?”

Minho is pretty out of it, as expected, and deliriously takes turns flirting with Newt and Teresa. Newt’s cheeks pink in embarrassment but Teresa only smirks, amused, and indulges him, sitting at the edge of the bed as Minho asks them why the ceiling is pink (it isn’t) and rattles off mashed-up pickup lines like, _Hey baby are you tired because you ran away from heaven?_

Newt chokes on a laugh and Teresa furiously bites hers. The next day he is more aware and plagued with mortification. Newt only feels just a little bad.

When Minho is up and walking around with them and Thomas still has yet to awaken, Teresa bites her nails to the cuticles and picks fights with the nurses on the regular. She is quieter now, only speaking when Newt or Minho speak to her first, and rarely includes herself in conversations. She eats less than she should, something which drives the nurses to pull their hair out of the roots, and she’s is already on pretty thin ice as far as they’re concerned, nibbling on carrots and drawing crop circles with her fork into the mashed potato.

One night he wakes to hear her crying in her bed; soft, broken sobs she fights to keep silent. Newt lies still until she is done, and waits for her to fall back asleep.

Nearly two weeks in, Teresa throws the jug of water that sits by their beds against the wall when a nurse tells her she isn’t allowed to leave her room unsupervised until she eats more. It explodes like a water balloon on impact, and the nurse screams. They take her into detention for it, and Newt expects her to kick and scream as she goes, but instead she keeps her head low and walks freely.

Newt sits alone in the cafeteria the next day to await Minho, too aware of the empty chair beside him. When Minho finally arrives it is with a blonde girl under his arm, presenting her to Newt.

“I found this one in the room next to mine,” he says, “Can we keep her?”

Things are never boring with Minho.

The girl smiles pleasantly and introduces herself as Sonya. They sit.

“Where’s Teresa?” Minho asks, looking around the room as if he expects to find her at another table. Newt eats one half of his sandwich before he tells them. 

He finally sees Teresa again three days later. She all but falls into her usual chair beside Newt, so unexpected that Minho chokes on his water and Sonya jumps, startled white. She reminds Newt if a tiny rabbit, freezing at the smallest of sounds.

An overwhelming urge to throw his arms around Teresa fills Newt, even as she steals his plate and begins to unceremoniously shovel food into her mouth like a hoover vacuum he’s seen advertised on holoboards. He didn’t expect to miss her as much as he has.

“Whoa, whoa!” Minho cries, “Breathe, girl, breathe.” 

“Sorry,” She mumbles through a mouthful of bread, “I’m just hungry.”

“And whose fault is that?” Newt says, earning a sharp elbow. “You look better.”

“Thomas woke up last night. They told me this morning. Still not allowed to see him, though,” Teresa says, stabbing a potato with the regulation spork, “But he’s awake!”

Her eyes are brighter than before, cheeks flushed with excitement and relief.

“That’s great!”

“Yeah, I – Oh! Sorry! Hi, I’m Teresa.”

After the girls introduce themselves and they and Minho launch into a conversation, Newt’s mind drifts. Why did it take so much longer for Thomas to recover than it had for the rest of them? The benches in the cafeteria have filled up by almost half since he’s been up and about, a couple of them Newt managed to recognise from the line at the convention centre all those weeks ago, and a few from the Berg flight over here.

(He remembers Thomas’ anxious foot tapping the whole way over, his thigh pressed flush against Newt’s and shaking through his entire body. Newt had leaned over to him at once point, whispering in his ear, “Statistically, we have a higher chance of being struck out of the sky by burning space debris than this thing crashing,” because he assumed Thomas was just afraid of heights.

It worked, somewhat. Thomas leaned closer and told him, “Highly possible, actually. Space debris has nearly doubled in the last ten years alone and tripled in twenty. We could actually be hit.”

Newt rolled his eyes, “Alright, smarty-pants. Just trying to lighten the mood. Wasn’t going to mention the potential for random airstrikes, but …”

Thomas laughed and bumped his shoulder against Newt. “This is you calming me down?”

“Was just trying to make conversation. I assumed you had a sense of humour. My mistake.”

Thomas flipped him off, but he was smiling and his leg had stilled. They remained pressed together until the berg landed.)

Now, looking back, he didn’t question it at the time; why Thomas was so worried, why Teresa and his hands were locked together right up until they were separated to begin the donation process, why he looked pale and terrified.

Why the nurse said, _Kids like him take longer to wake up. _

When the nurse comes into their room and says that Thomas is now fit for visitors, Teresa is on her feet before the woman can finish her sentence. Newt stands, also. The nurse holds up her palms, “Oh, no! One at a time, please. The poor boy is still weak, let’s not overwhelm him.”

Shame passes over Newt, and he is about to sit back down when Teresa says, “He can come. We’re friends, and we promise to be quiet.”

The woman appears doubtful but relents in the end.

“Very well, follow me, then.”

Newt and Teresa jump to her heels. She takes them around the corner and down the hall to Thomas’ room and lets them inside.

She tells them they have half an hour and when Teresa immediately begins to argue, the man looks at her sternly and says, “That’s all that is allowed at this stage, I’m sorry.” She leaves them alone but makes a note of telling them that she will remain outside the door for the duration of their visit.

When Newt turns and looks at Thomas properly for the first time, he thinks the nurse has made some sort of mistake because he definitely doesn’t look awake, until Teresa leans forward and touches his hand, and his eyes open into slits. He has a cannula in his nose. Newt doesn’t remember if he had needed one, but Minho certainly didn’t. Thomas groans softly when Teresa sits on the edge of his bed, hands shaking and mouth pressed in a thin line, looking like she might cry. Newt walks over to the wall and leans against it, keeping his movements light, feeling like he is intruding.

“Hey,” Teresa is murmuring, “Hey, sleepy-head. You had me worried for a while there.”

Thomas moans something that sounds like _Sorry_. 

She rubs his arm, “No, shh, it’s okay. You’re awake now, that’s all that matters. Hey,” She leans down closer to a whisper. Newt fidgets. Maybe he should leave. He probably shouldn’t have come after all. “You made it through. You’re a donor. You did it.”

Thomas squeaks out a weak, delirious, _Yaaay. _Newt laughs and Teresa looks up at him like she’d forgotten he was there. “Oh! Newt’s here, too. Remember Newt? He’s over there.”

Thomas’ head lulls to the side and he settles his blurry eyes on Newt, squinting to see better. Newt waves and says, “Hi, Tommy,” and cringes at himself.

Thomas’ arm flops on the bed. He supposes that was meant to be a returning wave.

He eventually migrates over to the bed and he and Teresa talk at Thomas for thirty minutes. Thomas adds to the conversation in the form of groans and half-formed words that get jumbled and lost along the way. Teresa doesn’t let go of his hand, and at one point Thomas’ other one finds it’s way into Newt’s lap and stays there until the nurse gingerly opens the door to tell them that their time is up. Thomas’ hand tangles in Teresa’s shirt when she stands to leave, but the nurse comes over to give him another pump of morphine, and he falls right back asleep.

The next time they visit Thomas’ room they bring Minho, and then Sonya the time after that. She brings her own roommate with her the next, a girl named Harriet, and before they know it Thomas’ room is a full house. The nurses complain but nothing ever changes, so eventually they settle for telling them to keep the noise at a minimum. They marvel in the fact that Thomas still has his own room, to which he says, “It’s because I’m special.”

And Minho says, “That’s one way to put it.”

And Thomas throws a pillow at his head.

Rounding the second week, whenever they open the door, Thomas looks so bored that Newt half expects him to pounce and make a break for it as soon as the door swings open. He’s lost the cannula but the drip remains, keeping him trapped in place. He is looking better, at least – his face has more colour and his eyes are brighter and more alert, the circles under them dimming. He lights up when he sees them, instantly making room for Newt and Teresa on the bed. When the nurse arrives he wastes no time in asking them when he can leave.

They’re all gone but Newt lingers back one day because Janson wanders into the room with a chart and positive attitude and Thomas gives him one pleading look, and that was that.

“My legs are turning to jelly,” Thomas is saying, as Janson walks around his bed checking this and that.

“You’ll get to move around once you have been cleared,” Janson says, testing Thomas’ blood pressure, tone low and incurious.

Thomas’ fists clench around the blankets, “When am I getting cleared, then? It’s been a _week_.” 

“I’m sure it won’t be for much longer.”

“Can I just –” Thomas’ free hand finds his hair, and he looks like he wants to rip it out, “Can I stand, at least? You can be in the room, I just –”

“Thomas –”

“My lungs won’t give out if I _stand up_, okay? If that’s what you’re worried about. I’ve lived with them this long. I know how to handle simple shit, believe it or not.”

Newt goes very still. Janson leans back and takes a deep, controlled breath, his eye darting over Newt briefly as if he wished he weren’t in the room. “Thomas,” he begins, “I understand that, believe me. But WCKD would very much like it if nothing happened to their candidate's _post_-donation.”

Newt hears the breath catch in Thomas’ throat and Newt instinctively places a hand over his balled-up fist on the mattress.

“So don’t worry,” Janson continues, “The second I get the clearance I’ll be rushing right over. You’re safe here, Thomas.”

Under Newt’s hand, Thomas’ relaxes a little. Dr. Janson looks between them with a curious expression, but only says, “I’ll give you boys five more minutes. But after that, Newt, please return to your room.”

He says it with such sly conviviality that Newt half expects him to say that the door will remain open on his way out, but he just leaves and the door clicks closed behind him, harmless. Thomas slumps against the pillows with a loud huff. Newt glances at him from the corner of his eyes.

He looks at Newt, eyebrows twitching upward.

Newt says, “Okay. Let’s get you up.”

Hands gripping Thomas’ waist while Thomas’ hangs on to Newt’s shoulders tight, he supports most of his weight seeing as, apparently, he wasn’t kidding when he said his legs felt like jelly. Thomas’ knees almost give out the second he is up but Newt is quick to catch him, and they stand in the middle of the room – two strangers in a half embrace. Thomas’ hair tickles his nose and Newt worries about the state of his breath, for a moment, when Thomas turns toward him and smiles, awkward, and mumbles, “Thanks.”

Newt smiles back, just as awkward. “No problem,” he says, adjusting his hold of Thomas’ waist.

“Sorry, this is weird –”

“It isn’t weird,” Newt says before he can stop himself, and Thomas gives him an unreadable look in return. His teeth are whiter than Newt expected them to be, and Newt’s new nose picks up the scent of the facility’s regulation anti-septic body wash, linen, and perspiration.

“Okay,” Thomas shrugs – about as well as a person who can’t support his own body weight can shrug, that is – and says, “I guess weird things do cancel each other out.”

“Um,” Newt raises an eyebrow, “Are you calling me weird, Tommy?”

And there it is again. The nickname. If it bothers Thomas, he doesn’t say. “I’m – yeah, I’m calling you weird. Who starts rattling off statistics about dying mid-air?”

“Who gets scared flying in a bloody Berg? Of all things?”

Thomas’ mouth presses. “Alright, fair. Agree to disagree?”

Newt rolls his eyes. “Fine.”

The radio plays in the corner; a slow, dreamy melody that Newt doesn’t recognise. It’s funny, but it nearly feels like they’re dancing, with the singer’s smooth voice filling the small room as they stand there, chest to chest, swaying side to side as they wait for Thomas’ legs to come back to life.

After a few minutes Thomas tells him, “I think I’ve got it now,” and let's go of Newt without warning, only to immediately drop, flailing out to catch himself on the side of the bed. Newt swears and catches him before he completely hits the ground. Thomas makes a noise like he is winded. Newt lifts him back on the bed, and Thomas leans over his knees, breathing deeply. Newt kneels down in front of him.

“You okay?”

Thomas nods weakly, touching his chest, “Yeah. I’m – ugh. Maybe he had a point.” His voice – as Newt has also noticed with Teresa – has that rasp to it that Newt has heard on heavy smokers in the barrels of Arizona, men and women whose lungs have almost given out on them after years and years of substance abuse, and desert dwellers, as well – where the dust is the thickest and most unrelenting. Newt and Minho had tried their hand at desert dwelling two years ago. The result, after a week of sleeping on the outskirts of the Nirvana desert, was the development of the very same gravely tone in their voices, and a sandy feeling in the back of their throats that made their eyes water when they coughed.

He shudders at the memory. He and Minho got out of there as soon as they could, and never looked back.

Thomas grows tired very quickly. Newt helps him back into bed, tucking his legs up and smoothing the blanket around his hips the way that Janson had left it so that when the man eventually pokes his head in to tell them their five minutes are up, he feels nothing is amiss.

Newt leaves Thomas and walks slowly back to his own room, a million thoughts in his head. Teresa attacks him the second he is through the door. She barrels into him hard and throws her arms around his neck, pressing her face to his chest. The force leaves him winded, coughing once.

“I just remembered!” She gasps, “I never said it! I never said thank you.”

Newt grabs her shoulders and pushes her out to arm’s length and deduces, no, she doesn’t look like she’s hit her head.

“Thank you for what?”

“For bringing us with you,” Teresa says, “For telling the guard you knew us. Who knows when they would have taken us – if they took us in at all. We might even still be waiting out there today if it wasn’t for you and Minho.”

“_Oh_,” Newt says, warmth tickling his insides, “Uh, that’s okay. Don’t mention it.”

She kisses his cheek and they return to their beds to play word games until the lights go out and Teresa rolls over, falling asleep within minutes. Newt mind is wide awake. He lies in the darkness, staring at the ceiling with Thomas’ words replaying over in his mind: _My lungs won’t give out if I stand up._

Thomas, Newt later discovers, suffers from an acute form of asthma. It is caused by the dust storms, and years of living in the desert are mostly at fault. While it is not particularly life-threatening in any way, the doctors are still worried that the donation process would have made it so. By day five, when they go to visit him (picking up a couple more stragglers along the way named Winston and Fry, because Minho is a social butterfly, apparently), Thomas looks ready to commit mass genocide. He winces when they walk in and see him laid in the bed, staring up at the ceiling and ready to gouge his eyes out with boredom, and worries that the flurry of attention would be too much today.

Teresa senses this too, sharing a look with Newt. It goes smooth enough, though. Thomas talks a bit less than he normally would and only snaps once when Winston asks one too many questions. The room dissolves into silence after that, until Sonya claps her hands and suggests that they should all move into the courtyard, like the five-foot-three saving grace that she is.

Newt, Teresa, and Minho stay with him for ten more minutes until Thomas announces that he wants to sleep and rolls over onto his side, not waiting for a response. Teresa has a crease between her eyebrows that she wipes away whenever she sees anyone looking.

Their table in the cafeteria is steadily growing, as is the spot by the window overlooking the horizon. The last to join their group is Brenda, who Harriet apparently found trying to steal chocolate from a vending machine – and succeeding at that – and Gally, a boy with a permanent scowl and scarring below his eyes, who lives in the room beside Fry’s.

Newt doesn’t think he’s been around this many people at one time in his life. If the way Minho is leaning back in his chair, as if the sound of everyone’s voices stacking on top of each other is anything to go by, Newt can guess his friend feels similar.

They try and distract Teresa as best as they can, pulling her into conversations and take her around the facility for walks. Brenda snatches her off to the courtyard for a couple of hours each day, to look at rose bushes or climb trees or plan espionage or whatever it is they do all day. Newt doesn’t know if it’s him she is getting tired of, or just the concept of sharing her room with a boy for three weeks – and not even the one she likes – but has to be one of the two.

The radio has replayed the same few broadcasts for their entire stay in this room to the point that they can now guess which song will come next. They’ve made a game of it, too.

“_Country Roads_,” Newt says, lying on his back with one ankle crossed over his knee, picking at a scab.

“No,” Teresa says, “_Angel Band_. This DJ’s into the older, more gospel stuff.”

Newt hums. “No, I’m pretty sure it’s _Country Roads_. In about twenty minutes she’ll call half time and then put on _I’ll fly away_.”

“Yeah,” Teresa says, “And before that it’s _Angel Band_.”

“No, it’s bloody _Country Roads_.”

“Okay. We’ll see then.”

When two minutes later the opening chords to _Angel Band_ begin to play, Newt looks over at Teresa expecting her to be smiling in victory, but her face is blank and staring at the ceiling as he left her. The radio is switched off earlier that night. Teresa’s excuse is that she feels a headache approaching and requires peace and quiet. When the lights are off, and Newt is beginning to doze off, it is then that he hears her voice in the darkness; small and wavering, “How do you do it? I’m going insane. I feel like I can’t breathe in this place.”

Newt turns in his bed to face her. Her blue eyes are black in the darkness. “Just close your eyes and pretend you’re somewhere else,” he says.

“Is that it?”

Newt shrugs, even though she can’t see, “It’s what I do.”

In his mind he sees wide, open water and green fields that span as far as the eye could see, not a spec of sand or dust anywhere. The sky is clear – blue, not brown or grey or murky in any way – and the sun is warm on his face. It does not burn.

As usual, Newt listens for the tell-tale signs that Teresa has fallen asleep before he allows himself to. The ghost of the radio sings to him at the back of his mind: ‘_O bear me away on your snow white wings, to my immortal home ..._

Newt’s fourth week at the facility rolls in with an announcement from WCKD themselves, thus almost drawing a close to their stay at the Callisto Project. Everyone is ushered into a large amphitheater Newt had no idea existed until now. The air as they walk inside is odd and thick, all hushed whispers and curious faces. Minho sticks close to Newt in a way he hasn’t in a month; whenever they were in self-dubbed hostile territory Minho would hold on to Newt’s wrist, sleeve, or collar to insure that if trouble were to arise suddenly he would be able to pull him along as they ran. Newt gives him a strange look, glancing at their hands, but Minho just shrugs.

Everyone finds their seats, sticking relatively close together. Sonya slouches in front of him, thumbnail between her teeth, with Harriet and Gally on either side of her. Fry fiddles with the cuff of his sleeve on the other side of Minho, who leans over the gap to talk quietly in his ear, while on the other side of Newt Teresa sits upright in her seat, eyes focused and forward. Winston and Jeff, the newest addition to their little circle, talk quietly amongst themselves.

“What do you think this is about?” Sonya asks. A very long strand of hair floats around due to the room’s air-conditioning. Newt gently pushes it down.

“You think we’re finally getting out of here?” Gally adds.

Beside Teresa, Brenda leans forward and says, “Better be. If not I’m breaking out tonight. Who’s with me?”

“Hear, hear,” Fry says, fist-pumping the air. 

Newt opens his mouth to speak when behind him, right by his ear, he hears, “Looks like some kind of presentation,” and their small group gasps in unison.

Newt turns to find Thomas a handful of inches from his face, grinning ear to ear. The reaction to the sudden appearance is a slow but loud one when it finally hits. A guard glares – or Newt would assume he glares – and shushes them when they all cheer and lift from their seats to hug or slap him on the back.

A couple of days prior, Thomas had finally been released from his quote-unquote prison cell. However, it was only to walk around the room or hall, and never for longer than one hour at a time. His legs hurt so much that, at first, Newt and Teresa needed to support most of his weight as he struggled to stand on his own. It took a few rounds but finally he could balance on his own, and a day after that he needed no help at all.

(Sometimes he’ll hold on to Newt’s arm when he felt he needed assistance, teeth clenched and eyebrows furrowed, hiding his discomfort as best as he could from Teresa.)

Now, she doesn’t throw her arms around him and cling like Newt expected, but rather leans back and touches her knuckles to the back of his hand, smile soft and warm. “Welcome back,” she whispers.

Minho does the same, but to Thomas’ shoulder and less delicate. “When’d they let you out?”

“This morning,” Thomas says, “They figured they’d just move me now since everyone’s moving into the dorms after this.”

“Dorms?” Jeff asks, apparently just as confused as Newt felt. “What dorms?”

Thomas frowns. “Did you guys not know that? Huh. Wait, am I supposed to know that? You’d be surprised what you overhear when you’re locked in a room all day. Nurses kind of forget you’re there.”

“They’re moving us _again?_” Winston whines.

Thomas doesn’t have a chance to answer as, on cue, the lights dim and the room dissolves into silence. The wall-length screen at the front of the room opens into an even larger screen, and the projector above their heads whirls to life. Thomas leans his arms on the back of Newt’s seat and rests his chin on top, right beside his shoulder. Newt looks at him; the slight upturn of his nose, backlit in the darkness, the soft fan of eyelashes and the curve of his cheeks, fuller now after weeks of proper food and nutrition.

“Hi,” Newt whispers.

“Hey,” Thomas whispers back, smiling. The presentation begins.

It’s pretty standard, beginning with an opening animation of Callisto the glowing moon, a visualisation of the domes that will one day exist and in a woman’s chirpy voice, _WCKD thanks you for your help! By becoming a Donor you have already played the most vital role in humanity’s continued existence! Congratulations! _– Newt and Minho share an eye roll. Personally, he couldn’t give a shit about humanity’s continued survival, not on this planet or the next. Maybe they’ll blow up Callisto as they did to this one. Either way, Newt is here for the aftercare.

The presentation wraps up with a song that Newt recognises in the way one would recognise the opening jingle to their grandparents' favourite television show. He faintly knows the tune to the anthem but none of the words. Supposedly there were many songs before this one, beginning with each country having their own, which then moved into continent when the third war came, and then southern and northern hemisphere by the end of it, until finally it was just Earth. Back when it was called Earth.

The song ends and the lights come back on. A woman walks onto the stage, her heels clicking across the podium before she stops right in the middle and faces the room. Her face fills up the mammoth screen behind her.

“Good evening, everyone,” she begins. “May I take a moment to personally thank each and every one of you for being here today. I know you’ve heard it countless times over the past few weeks, but your participation in the Donor Program is truly commemorative.” She pauses, taking a moment to look over the crowd before continuing, in a softer tone, “I know it has not been an easy process. Harder for some than others.” Behind Newt, Thomas snorts, “But to those of you who remain here today, and at the risk of sounding like a broken record, humanity thanks you.”

“Uh,” Fry leans back, “What did she mean by that last part? Second to last part?”

In the dim lighting of the room, Thomas’ face scrounges, “I heard a few nurses talking about how some people … didn’t make it all the way through. And then others never woke up afterward. It was too much to give.”

Newt counts the number of weeks it took for Thomas to wake up. Beside him, Teresa pales.

The woman goes on to introduce herself as Ava, the head chair of WCKD Corp. and one of the founders of the Callisto Project. Three other boring old men in white step on to the stage following her introduction, and they each get their chance to speak. Newt’s attention drifts halfway through the first. Minho, who had lost it far before then, slumps in his seat and plays with Newt’s sleeve.

“Just tell us what’s happening next,” Thomas whispers, “Literally who the hell cares about all this?”

“You don’t care about the history of WCKD and it’s purpose on grand old planet Earth before the wars? I’m pretty sure that counts as a capital offense.”

Thomas rolls his eyes, “What are they going to do? Lock me up again?”

Newt mock gasps, “They’ll take away your morning jelly!”

Thomas snorts, knocking Newt’s shoulder with his elbow, “Only allowed to walk around _half_ the compound.”

“Radio time is limited to _two_ broadcast playbacks.”

Thomas shudders. “Oh, Jesus, as long as I get to pick.”

Minho, yawning, says, “Hey, guys, can you keep it down? This is riveting shit right here.”

Right on cue, a nearby patrolling guard shushes them loudly on his way past, making Gally, previously spacing out, start. Thomas presses his face into his folded arms, shoulders trembling with laughter. By the time the third and final guest has wrapped up his spiel Sonya has begun using Harriet as a pillow, Jeff, Winston, and Fry are playing rock-paper-scissors and Brenda has swivelled around in her seat, braiding a section of Teresa’s hair that the latter has to awkwardly lean over the arm of her chair for.

“Hold still,” he hears Brenda snipe over Teresa complaining, “Braid your own hair!”

Newt’s attention shifts in and out after that. They manage to pull him, and many others, to the surface when an image of a man appears on the screen, head to toe. He looks normal enough until Newt realises that this is the future of the human race, and the man on screen is made up of someone else’s genetic makeup.

The room is eerily quiet.

“As you can see,” Ava is explaining, arm gesturing broadly to the screen, “They will look just like us. They will see, smell, taste and feel just as we do now. They will, for all intents and purpose, be us.”

Ava steps forward. The light shining off her stark white pantsuit is near blinding. “This, ladies and gentlemen, is how we live on. This –” she points to the image once more “– is how humanity continues. To thrive and to prosper.”

_And to do better_, Newt hears, even though Ava never says so out loud.

“This is our future. And you,” She takes a moment to look out at the audience. Newt can’t help but feel like he’s sitting in at some motivational speech, “Will be our legacy.”

If Newt were to look back on this moment in his life, he would say that, right here, is when the reality of it all finally hit him. By becoming a Donor he has not only given his DNA, but his entire _life_ to the Program. One day, in hundreds of years’ time, when the communities are built and it is time for the great migration to take place, there will be a boy who will look and speak exactly like him.

A perfect replica.

The remainder of Newt’s stay at the compound is surprisingly short and sweet. Almost as soon as the presentation wraps up everyone is split up into dorms to await instruction. Newt feels sad to lose Teresa but happy to gain back Minho. Thomas and Winston are nice new additions, as well. She locks him in a long hug outside their door that earns a few stares and an exaggerated eyebrow wag from Minho, loving to tease despite knowing exactly which direction Newt’s interests lean.

Newt becomes used to his new roommates fairly quick. Minho and Winston like so share _My life is worse than yours_ stories in their downtime – which is all the time – and Thomas sleeps a lot. Newt doesn’t mind. He finds he enjoys the quiet, leaving him with time for himself and his thoughts. There was never any time for that on the road, and when there was they were spiralling, horrible and left him to waltz with his emotions and memories. But all that is in the past now.

The radio plays, constant.

His eyes create shapes in the darkness as Newt lies in his bunk, staring at the ceiling as his finger traces the embossment on his bare skin. His number has been a secret part of him for so long. Only three people in the world knew it before, and now it’s _thousands_. Newt’s name and number exist inside the registry forever. He will never be off the grid, a figure in the shadows, he will never be _no one_ again. 

He will never be alone.

Newt wonders if he should mind more that he does.

Knuckles rap against the bar of his bed, softly drawing his attention away from his thoughts. Thomas blinks at him in the silence, swaying on his toes.

“Hey,” he whispers, and Newt can picture the slightly crooked grin that he cannot make out in the dark, “You awake?”

Newt turns in bed, careful not to shake the bunk too much and disturb Minho below him. “If I said no?”

“I’d be impressed by your sleepwalking self’s level of consciousness. Can you rob banks like this?” Thomas remarks.

Newt hums, “Dunno. Never tried. That’s another thing for the bucket list, I suppose.”

Thomas breathes a laugh. “Scooch over?”

Newt makes room for Thomas on the bed and they sit side by side in the dark, leant against the wall not touching. Winston’s snoring aside, it is so quiet in the room that Newt is worried about breathing too loud, lest he disturbs something. Thomas’ thumb drums against his knee in quick beats, and he says, “I can’t believe it’s almost over.”

The back of Newt’s head presses against the cold wall. “Neither,” he says, “It almost doesn’t feel real. Less than a month ago Min and I were sleeping under a peer on Venice, wrestling seagulls for food.”

“You fought birds for food?”

Newt smirks. “No, Tommy, they _were_ the food.” Then, he winces, “Sorry, I don’t mean to keep calling you that.”

“Hm?” Thomas bristles, “No, no. I, uh. I like it.”

Newt is suddenly very thankful for the darkness.

Thomas elbows him lightly, a minute later, “What are you going to do after this?”

“God,” Newt groans, rubbing both hands down his face, “Hadn’t even thought about that. I guess a part of me is still in denial.”

When Newt pictured his future post-program, it consists of living where WCKD tell him to – maybe Minho is there, maybe he is somewhere else, in his own home – and spending the rest of his life in peaceful boredom until he dies fat and old and, hopefully maybe, happy.

(What will it be like, to watch the world end behind titanium glass? Will it be beautiful?)

“What about you?” Newt asks, before his thoughts can dive deeper.

He feels Thomas shrug against him. His skin is warm through the two layers of clothing between them. “Man, I don’t know,” he says, “This was such a hypothetical to begin with. We were just taking it a day at a time, you know? I haven’t had a chance to talk to Teresa. I’ve got no idea what she’s planning.”

“Figure it out tomorrow,” Newt says, a funny feeling settling in his stomach.

Thomas nods, “Yeah. I mean we’ve only got, what? Two, three more days here max? I heard –” he lowers his voice even more and leans into Newt, as if someone would ever be listening “– I heard them say they’re going to start distributing funds starting tomorrow. A few lucky bastards might even already know where they’re living.”

Newt shakes his head, “Where do you get all of this information?”

“Like I said – small room. Isolation. People forget you’re there.” Thomas says, “It’ll be an interesting couple of days. Staying here has been unbelievable. It’s going to feel weird once it’s over.”

The words hit a spot inside of Newt that leaves him feeling moody for the rest of the day afterward. Minho gives him looks out of the corner of his eye that are concerned but curious rather than probing. If Newt wanted to talk he would, but he doesn’t, and simply carries on this way. Something in Thomas’ words hit home. He pretends he doesn’t know why, but it is Teresa’s voice that Newt hears in the back of his mind, saying, _You don’t like change, do you?_

By the time Newt has shut the metaphorical doors and windows and packed up the imaginary boxes, Sonya comes running up to him, all hurricane of messy hair and bright, excited eyes. With a burst of _Hurry hurry hurry! _she takes Newt’s hand and, granola bar half hanging out of his mouth and hitting a solid 5.8 on the Richter scale of confusion, allows himself to be dragged through the facility. They make it all the way to the lookout window before Sonya stops to deposit him beside Minho and Thomas, who are thankfully as equally as confused.

It is Brenda’s idea for everyone to live together.

“Think about it,” she says, sitting cross-legged on the floor, facing them like a teacher facing her students, “We save on space and resources. Have you _seen_ the joints they’re hooking us up with? Why? What’s the point? One person to a three, four, five bedroom home? No way.” Brenda shakes her head.

“She’s right,” Fry pipes in, “To be honest, I wouldn’t know what to do with myself, cooped up alone in one of those.”

“Plus,” Harriet adds, “Triple the people to one home means triple the size of the house. I wouldn’t mind a pool,” she says, wistfully, hugging her knees, “Can’t remember the last time I’ve been in water.”

Gally frowns. “You’ve _been in water?_”

“You haven’t?”

Gally rolls his eyes, his mouth curling in the corners distastefully, “Not all of us have the luxury of clean ocean living, darling. Never even seen the ocean before –” he gestures to the view before them.

As they bicker back and forth, Newt leans back and thinks, silently agreeing to everything that has been raised forward. Saving on resources and homes is a good pitch, and not only will WCKD probably love it but it is an essential one at that. But, Newt doesn’t think that is the main attribute to them all wanting and agreeing to live together so easily.

They are outsiders, and runaways, and street kids or, in Thomas and Teresa’s case, desert dwellers. None of them have grown up in luxury, none of them knew what a proper meal or a shower meant before the Donor Program. The sudden shift into upper-class life, the kind that has been offered to them on a golden platter for allowing themselves to be poked and prodded, and stuck and swabbed and cut and split open for two whole weeks, would be too much of a culture shock. No one would know what to do with themselves. They wouldn’t know who they were anymore. All that would be left is a ghost of a past and the idea of a future. Newt can count the number of them who would crawl back onto the street in less than a month on one hand.

Newt himself would be one. Which is what leads him to say, “I’m in,” no hesitation.

Minho glances at him, shocked with a look of _Did you discuss this with me?_ morphing into _Maybe it’s a good idea_, and then _Okay it’s a really good idea,_ until finally, the inner battle dissolves and he hooks an arm around Newt’s shoulders, grinning ear to ear, “Same here.”

Next is Thomas, who simply says, “We’re in,” holding eye contact with Teresa the entire time. Her face is blank and gives no indication to whatever is happening on the inside of her head, but she doesn’t look mad about it in the slightest. Slowly but surely the rest of the group complies with the proposition put down on the table. Brenda cheers, followed by Minho, louder as if it’s a competition, and then soon enough they’re all yelling obnoxiously and receiving dirty looks from staff and other donors combined.

Thomas coughs into his sleeve, exerted from all the excitement. Newt bumps his knee with his own, demanding his attention. “Looks like you aren’t getting rid of us that easily,” he says, and to Teresa remarks, “Hey, what do you say? Want to be roomies again? You can have the top draw and I’ll take the bottom.”

Teresa scoffs and shakes her head. “Think I’m going to have to pass on that one, sorry,” she says.

Newt pretends to be hurt, “But I fixed my nose and everything,” and Teresa chuckles into her sleeve with that soft, self-restrained laugh that most desert dwellers have, like they’re trying to keep the cough down in their throats from escaping. Thomas has the same.

“Yeah, okay,” Minho adds, “But you still thrash around like a dying gorilla. Can they fix that, too?”

Teresa laughs harder. Thomas looks between her and Newt with an odd expression.

Up front, Brenda claps her hands to regain everyone’s attention, and stop the squabbling, “Okay! So it’s decided, then? We’re doing this?”

Sonya leans forward and hugs her knees, grin bright, “We’re doing this.”


	2. The House on Paradise Hill

The house is just short of huge – or _fucking huge_ if you were feeling particularly fervent. Just on the outskirts of Los Vegas, due to its size it sits practically on its own hill, two stories high and, somehow, white and unstained. There is a pool.

WCKD had, of course, loved the group’s proposition to share a home and gave them one of accurate magnitude to accommodate for all eleven of them. Some would have to share a bedroom – those who will have already decided, on the ride over – but to them that is no sacrifice at all, if the way Sonya jumps at almost every new, loud noise and Gally’s intense need to immediately scope out a new environment is anything to go by. And now, standing in the middle of the parlour and looking out into the rest of the house while the others run around and cheer, their voices carrying through the home in reverbs, it feels almost wrong.

His clothes don’t fit, his bags are too dirty, and the ghost of the ever-present layer of dust on his skin, now scrubbed away from weeks of actual hot showers and soap – a concept he’s still wrapping his head around. They all serve as a stark reminder to Newt of who he is, and where he comes from.

Newt closes his eyes as his new friends run havoc around their new home – _new home!_ – while two ghosts stand over his shoulder. He feels their frosty breath on the back of his neck, whispering into his ear, telling him to run. _It isn’t safe_, they whisper still, _Trust no one. They have your number now, there is nowhere to hide anymore._

A hand lands firmly on Newt’s shoulder, making him start. When he turns Minho is looking at him with deep, grounding eyes, and Newt somehow remembers to breathe.

Thomas shuffles through the front door, fashionably last, and carrying what seems to be everyone’s bags for whatever reason. He hoists them up onto the patio, tan face glistening with a sheer layer of sweat, swearing. He leaves everyone’s but two which Newt assumes must be his own and Teresa’s, and walks inside to bask in the cool air.

It is filtered. Newt’s lungs have never felt so clear. He couldn’t begin to imagine how Thomas must be feeling.

Minho walks around and slings an arm around both of their necks, grinning broadly. Strands of hair which do not stick to his forehead fly about in the invisible breeze. “Soak it in, boys,” he says, breathing deep. “Man. If this is the prize for survival I should’ve been rich a long time ago.”

“Technically,” Thomas begins, “We aren’t rich. WCKD is rich, on our behalf. We just live here.”

Minho hums, “Cute. Don’t care.” And then, bellowing loudly and nearly deafening both of them in the process, shouts, “I call city view!” to what Newt assumes would be the rest of the house. It probably reaches them, too.

Thomas laughs as Minho barrels up the stairs without a second thought, and Newt is busy dealing with the ringing in his ears.

“You know where you want to live yet?” Thomas asks, pulling the strap of his bags firmer on his shoulder. His shirt hangs loosely over his collarbone and the movement pulls it taught. Newt looks away.

“Nah,” he says, scuffing his shoes on the high-polish concrete, a little disappointed when it doesn’t leave a mark, “I’ll just take whatever’s left, I s’pose.”

He takes the corner bedroom in the right wing, overlooking the desert, directly opposite Thomas’. Seated on the plush white sheets that give a little bounce when he moves, he stares out over the horizon. Minho and Gally squabbling for the claim of the bedroom opposite, their voices carrying through the wall like a couple of mongeese aside, the scene is quite peaceful. Newt resides to sit there all afternoon and watch the sunset over the rolling desert hills, turning the land gold.

Thomas’ laugh echoes down the hall, weaving elegantly through the peach-scented air. Newt tells the ghosts to go home. He is right where he should be. 

It should be a little disconcerting, to be perfectly honest, how well each of them adjusts to their new life. Winston finds the keys to the garage – of which, they had no idea existed beforehand – and inside it, two Jeeps covered in fabric. It is so last-thought and out of the way that Newt is left to wonder if someone left them here and forgot about them. Either way, Brenda takes advantage of the mostly empty neighbourhood, the rolling hills and the sun-bleached tan roads to teach anyone who wishes to learn how to drive.

It goes well enough until Sonya skims the side of the car on a fire hydrant and Minho nearly drives the whole thing through the living room window. Newt and Thomas sit on the second-story balcony, legs dangling off the edge as Minho receives an ear full from a very red-faced Brenda, yelling over his hysterical apologies as he slowly backs away, laughing until they cry.

“Can you drive?” Thomas asks Newt one evening. He is sitting in the driver’s seat, fingers drumming an invisible rhythm against the steering wheel.

Newt clears his throat before answering. “Uh, not really. Dad tried to teach me when I was younger, but.” He shrugs, “It didn't take.”

Thomas nods as if this is normal, and Newt does not mention that he had been eight at the time, and his father only attempted to teach him lest anything happened to either him or Newt’s mother and they couldn’t, and slapped him across the face when he made a mistake.

Newt wipes both the memory and the invisible sting on his cheek from his mind, and asks Thomas, “You?”

Thomas fiddles with the front mirror, “A little. We were taught at the community. Supply runs, you know? Sometimes it was hard for the adults to do it all the time.”

Newt accepts this and doesn’t ask questions. He stands and walks over to the car, leaning over the passenger side door. It is hot today, the summer in full, unrelenting swing, and the sun burns his back. He asks, “Show me?” and five minutes later they’re soaring down the winding hills at full speed, air through the open windows stealing Newt’s hair from its elastic’s hold and sending it flying around his head like a hurricane. 

The speed concerns him at the back of his mind but Thomas looks confident enough, laughing as he drives, carefree and fearless. They receive a fair share of dirty looks from neighbours and pedestrians when they reach the bottom of the hill where the streets narrow, and the number of collision worthy obstacles in their way doubles.

They barely scrape to a stop around a bend leading into a quaint little cul de sac, sand and dust floating around the car in a smoky cloud. Newt laughs through it, breathless and heart-pounding faster than the speed of the car, as an old man dressed in a kimono swears at them before retreating into his ultra-futurism home. This makes them laugh harder, doubling over in their seats.

“Okay,” Thomas says, a minute later, wiping away tears from the corner of his eye, coughing between chuckles. “Okay, your turn.”

This cuts Newt’s own laughter off at the knees, and he sobers almost immediately. “What? My turn for what?” _Oh god_, Thomas is getting out of the car.

“Your turn to drive,” he says, hopping out onto the hot pavement, “You can take us back up.”

Newt, having a meltdown, “Up the _hill?_”

Thomas opens Newt’s door with a pleasant expression. “Yep,” he says, reaching around Newt’s waist to unbuckle his seat belt, “All the way up. It'll be fine.” 

Newt considers, for a solid length of time, being a child and gripping the seat, and refusing to exit the car. Or, simply, walking back up to the house if Thomas doesn’t relent. He can see it in his mind's eye; trudging up the hill in the 100-degree heat while Thomas trails him in the Jeep, furtively laughing at his misery.

“C’mon,” Thomas says, one foot on the step, “Scoot over.”

Newt climbs over the center console and into the driver’s seat, his fingers and toes tingling with antecedent anxiety, as Thomas hops back into the passenger’s side and shuts the door. The slam, though not loud enough to be considered a slam in the most traditional sense, echoes through the barrel of the car, and through his skull. Newt grips the steering wheel like a life ring and silently wishes Thomas had the good grace to point the car in the direction of the house before he stuck Newt in this position.

In the close proximity, Thomas smells like generic deodorant and sweat when he leans over to point out various features of the car to Newt. When he says, “That’s the break and that’s the accelerator, don’t have both feet on them at the same time,” a voice whispers in Newt’s ear, _Keep on doing that and you’ll crash and kill us all. _

A slow crawl up the hill, Thomas leans back, confident, and says, “Yeah, that’s good. You’re doing great.”

Newt hears, _That was terrible, are you being awful on purpose? _

He shuts his eyes, tuning them out. When Thomas places a shockingly cool hand over Newt’s on the steering wheel to guide him some, Newt nearly doesn’t flinch.

When they round a corner, Newt managing to stay on the right side of the road, Thomas leans forward and says, “You’re really doing great, Newt. Relax a little more.”

He isn’t sure whether it's the aspect of the road widening out at this point on the mountain, or Thomas’ gentle encouragement and quiet enthusiasm in his ear, but Newt is surprised to find himself growing more confident the further on they travel. He speeds up more and more and by the time the house appears in their line of sight Newt is driving at the normal human speed, hands sure and firm on the wheel, not tense.

“Wow,” Thomas murmurs, head sticking out the window to stare down at the ground below, for whatever reason, “You’re actually a natural at this.”

Newt fights between the two amazing options of, _You’re surprised?_ and, _I’m pretty sure you just have sunstroke _but in the end settles with, “I just have a good teacher.”

If Thomas beams, then, it’s probably just the sun on his face.

A shard of light through the window cuts Thomas down the middle, paling his eyes until they resemble smooth stones, and Newt is so distracted for a moment that he pulls a Sonya and drives one wheel up on the curb, barely skimming a mailbox and taking half a shrub with them.

Newt swears, eyeing the rear-view mirror with mortification, and speeds up a little. The bush bounces along the road behind them, miserably, before coming to a stop. Thomas laughs so hard he nearly has an asthma attack. 

“One time I lived in a sewage pipe in Georgia,” Winston tells Minho, who are back on their_ one-up _bullshit.

Minho nods sagely as if he is thoroughly considering the information put forward, and asks, “For how long?”

Winston hums. He is laid near vertically on the couch, one leg over the back and the other rested atop of Jeff’s shoulder. The latter pushes it off, periodically, annoyed. “Would have been about three months?”

Minho scoffs, “Nah, weak.”

“Three _months?_” Winston squeaks, shifting around to see Minho better. The heel of his shoe bounces off Jeff’s cheekbone, who sweats profusely in return and whacks him in the nose. After a minute, he continues, “It smelt like shit, like, all the time. I had to plug my nose with aloe twenty-four-seven.”

Minho says, “At least you could plug it with something,” followed by a fairly tipsy chortle and a mixture of a response from the audience. As groans and shouts of outrage fill the room, from more than just Winston, Newt briefly wonders if he would be able to convince everyone that he had only met Minho at the convention centre and their history is all a lie. Gally rolls his eyes at maximum velocity and Harriet throws a handful of chips at his head.

“Alright, jackass,” Winston continues, “It’s your turn.”

Minho thinks for a moment, and then begins, “Hey, Newtie-kins,” and Newt’s former plan flies out the window, “Remember that time in Cali? We accidentally stole food from this shady dude off a corner but it turned out they were laced with v -”

Newt bristles before he can finish his sentence, gripping the sofa and nearly spilling his beer all over Brenda, “No, and I don’t _want _to!”

“Um,” Brenda sits up, clearly unfazed, “Wait, I want to hear the end of this.”

Newt wonders if the planet is at the right level of self-imploding for it to be entirely possible for the floor beneath their feet to open up and swallow him whole, and this conversation could end. He is all too conscious of Thomas at his feet, sat back against the couch with Teresa’s legs thrown casually over his shoulders.

Newt pinches the skin above his eyebrows with his thumb and forefinger. “You really don’t.”

“I say we put it to a vote,” Fry pipes in, the awful man that he is, raising his hand, “Who else wants to hear the end of this story?”

Newt has his face buried in the palms of his hands, so he never sees who did or didn’t raise their hand, although the affirmative cry leans more toward _most_. The memory isn’t a pleasant one – in fact, it is something he’s been trying to furiously repress since it happened. Newt peeks out through his fingers and locks his eyes with Minho, and, well, maybe it was the sheer mortification Minho saw there or simply the invisible threat of _I will skin you alive if you dare to continue_ that makes him back up, but Newt is grateful either way.

“You know what,” Minho sighs, leaning back against the arm of the loveseat, “I’ll tell you when you’re older.” Which Newt isn’t sure helps all that much, but it’s better.

Newt mouths _Thanks_, lowering his hands. Minho winks in return.

Later, after which Jeff had finished explaining about half an hour ago, in vivid technicolour detail, the community he stayed with for two weeks a couple of years ago in the valley of Georgia that had just been a front for some kind of end-of-days-sex-cult, of all things, Newt sits out by the pool. The late afternoon air feels crisp and silky on his skin. He tests it, rubbing the palms of his hands together and, unsurprisingly, feels no traction or grit. The air purifiers whirl softly overhead.

Toward the front of the long of a swimming pool Sonya squeals as she and Harriet rough-house, dangerously skirting the edge of the pool, where, at any moment, one slip up would cause one of both of them do go tumbling back into the green-lit waters, and – Oh, there they go.

Newt leans back in the covered lounge that he assumes is meant to look high-fashion but only excels in resembling one half of an egg lying on its side, as Sonya surfaces and spits water all of Harriet’s face in revenge.

The sun is almost past the horizon line when Teresa pokes her head in from over the top of the sun visor. “Hey, stranger,” she smiles.

“Hello to you, too,” Newt says, instantly shuffling over to make room. Teresa crawls into the egg and collapses against the cushions beside Newt.

They lounge in comfortable silence for a while, watching the girls swim the length of the pool and shouting encouragements to each whenever they reach them (Teresa on Harriet and Newt on Sonya. _Harriet wins and I get the last yogurt cup in the fridge_, Teresa challenges. _Deal_, Newt says. They shake on it). The sun sets and the lights light up the house and the strip of the pool before she sighs, rolling her shoulders comfortably against the pillows.

“It’s still so hard to believe it’s real.” Teresa says, “Just three months ago Tom and I were in the middle of the desert, fighting for rations and burning from the sand and passing out from sunstroke every second day.”

“You’re still in the middle of the desert,” Newt remarks, bumping her shoulder with his. She rolls her eyes and pushes back. “The community wasn’t all it was cracked up to be?”

Teresa’s eyes gain a faraway look, and her voice is carefully even when she answers, “It was okay. Most days. Everyone was nice enough. Friendly. No one ever really caused trouble so we had no problems with, you know, keeping a peace,” she says. “I didn’t always live there. We moved when I was about ten? I think? After my parents … passed, my brother’s main concern was setting up something stable for me, and moving to the desert was the best solution he could come up with.”

Newt’s interest perks. This is new information. In all their weeks rooming together at the Program headquarters, Teresa’s former “living situation” was the one thing he was never able to get out of her.

“Your brother?” Newt says, and because he can be, admittedly, a bit of a moron sometimes (rarely, but it happens), asks, “Is he still there?”

And when Teresa’s eyes cloud and her gaze drops to her hands, the realisation hits him across the face. “I’m sorry, I didn't mean to … Sorry.”

Teresa shakes her head, eyes glassy but warm. “No, it’s okay. It happened a long time ago. I just wish …” She never finishes her sentence. At least, not out loud.

Newt moves on, and while telling himself that he should change the subject completely, or ask Teresa if she’d like to swim, if she knows how, or make some excuse and go inside and lock himself in Minho’s room, he just says; “How did you meet Thomas?” because he can’t help himself.

Teresa’s smile shifts into something indescribable, and she says, fondly, “He lived next door to where we moved in. You wouldn’t think so now, but he was such a tiny kid. Shy, too. Didn’t talk much. Took him over a month just to say hello to me. When everything with my brother happened his mom took me in, raised me like I was her own. And then she ended up getting sick, about a year ago, and we decided that was it. There wasn’t anything holding us there, anymore.”

“Joined the Donor Program,” Newt murmurs.

“And the rest is history.”

Newt watches her for a long moment, and then says, “You two are pretty close, then.”

Teresa nods, “Yes. He’s … all I have left. I’m all he has left, too, really. I love him,” She says, earnestly, “I couldn’t do any of this without him.”

Newt stares at the water at the edge of the pool, undulating in gentle waves.

“Yeah.”

Harriet wins the competition in the end and Newt valiantly sacrifices a yoghurt cup to a celebrating Teresa who, Newt thinks, could make an effort to do so less smugly. Newt pinches her elbow and she yelps, attempting to punch him in the gut, which is of course when Thomas decides to make his grand entrance. 

Newt doesn't think he has ever moved away from someone that fast in his life.

“Hey guys,” Thomas says, leaning against the side of the egg, “What are we gossiping about?”

Teresa, not even hesitating in the slightest, replies, “You,” and Newt wonders if it is entirely possible to drown himself in the pool without anyone noticing.

“Oh yeah?” Thomas raises an eyebrow, “Good things?”

As Teresa scoffs and Newt tries to slip into a posture that screams innocence_._ She says, “You’ll never know,” and bounces out of the egg, jostling Newt as she does, stretching her arms over her head once out.

“I’m going to go see if Fry wants a hand with dinner,” she says and leaves.

Thomas’ face immediately pales. “Oh, we're going to die.”

Newt feels the need to remind him about the other morning, stumbling down the stairs half asleep because Thomas set off three alarms in an attempt to make porridge, so he really has no right to talk.

What does happen, in the end, is Thomas sits down on the edge of the lounge and fiddles with the fringe trimming one of the cushions, posture stiff and strange, and Newt feels an awkward silence settle between them. He allows it to go on without breathing a word, strangely tongue-tied, eventually making some excuse that makes it out of his mouth but not necessarily to his ears, and flees inside.

Newt ends up hiding in Minho’s room for the rest of the night and denies it profusely.

Thomas is a morning person.

This is something Newt has, for extreme lack of trying, noticed in the short while they have lived under the same roof. Most days Newt will wander downstairs, bare feet dragging along the tile, to already find him leant against the island counter, loose sleep shirt, and freshly roasted coffee brewing. Sunlight streams in through the window in ribbons, bringing out the caramel in Thomas’ hair and illuminating their surroundings with a particularly ethereal sheen, while Newt is left to stand in the threshold wondering what simultaneously went so wrong and right with his life.

“Morning,” Newt would say, eyes on the floor or out in the garden or pretending to observe the large clock on the wall and sleepily wonder about the time. Thomas would mumble a reply, nose in a mug, and then attempt to engage Newt in conversion that Newt feels he should only be doing after he’s put something on that doesn’t expose an entire shoulder’s worth of skin on _accident_.

Today Thomas says, “Coffee?” and lifts an extra mug in offering.

Newt says, “I don’t drink coffee,” and leaves.

The next morning is the same; struggle downstairs with his hair covering one eye, following the smell of honey roasted blend that Brenda picked up in bulk at the store along with five packs of 20 600mL bottles of water (Rations. Some habits die hard). Sometimes he will walk into the kitchen to find Thomas alone or not, and other times he has just come back from the morning run or is preparing to leave. He will smile as soon as he sees Newt walk into the room, but Newt will see the two identical white mugs on the counter and his stomach would twist uncomfortably, and he will make an excuse to leave.

This carries on for some time until, one day, the epiphany hits that if Newt accepts the coffee and stays in the kitchen after Thomas leaves, then he will most probably avoid seeing him come back from the run all pink-faced and messy-haired and sweaty.

Thomas raises an eyebrow as Newt pours himself a mug of piping hot liquid, commenting, “I thought you didn’t drink coffee?” not making much of an effort to keep the smile out of his voice.

“Yeah, well,” Newt mumbles, miserably as he does most things, “Try new things, I guess.”

He takes a cautionary sniff before taking a sip. Thomas is looking at him, oddly.

“Don’t you want some milk? Or sugar?”

Newt shakes his head, taking another sip, larger, and feeling more awake already. Thomas stares at him like he is an alien. Newt then proceeds to tease him for some time, calling him a princess and such over Thomas’ loud objections, until Sonya wanders into the room and they quieten down. Thomas kicks his ankle and glares, but the corners of his mouth lift.

One early morning when Newt finds himself unable to sleep, he wanders downstairs to find Thomas seated by the southwest window in the middle of the vast carpeted floor, watching the sunrise. He brings his own mug and sits beside Thomas, already dressed for the day despite it barely being 6am.

“You already went out today?” Newt asks, clinking his mug against Thomas’ in greeting.

“No,” Thomas says, “Decided to skip this morning.”

His eyes are trained on the horizon, light beginning to fill the valley, his voice tight. Newt accepts this and doesn’t ask about the coughing he heard from his room the other night, nor Teresa’s very obvious disapproval of the regular running to begin with.

The two’s arguments aren’t particularly loud in any way, but they are almost impossible to ignore; Teresa’s concern for him being out in the unfiltered air for extended lengths of time and exerting his body and his lungs at the same time. Thomas basically told her she was being dramatic, but the recent increase in coughing fits and the weary, tired grey complexion Thomas’ face has adapted over the past week must have won out in her favour.

After a long minute, Newt says, “A couple of us are going down into the valley today. Apparently there’s this store that Fry wants to check out. Replica organic or something, I don’t know what he was going on about. He’s really gotten into food, huh? Lost love.” Thomas remains quiet, looking forward. Newt clears his throat, “Do you want to come? That is if you’re not under house arrest.”

This seems to do the trick. Thomas scoffs, his shoulders losing tension and his arms release their iron tight hold of his knees. “I’m not under house arrest. So yeah, sure. What money is he using?”

“Just the WCKD card,” Newt says.

Each Donor had been given their own card upon release from the facility; replenishable funds to pay for food and water and the like. A crease forms between Thomas’ eyebrows, and he says, “We’ve been using that too often lately. We should be more careful.”

“That’s what it’s there for. What else will we do with it? Frame it?”

The crease sticks around. Newt feels the sudden need to reach out and smooth it away with his thumb and sits on his hands. Thomas says, “Yeah, but …”

“But what?”

Thomas shakes his head. “Nothing. When do we leave?” Newt tells him. “Cool. I’ll tag along.”

They continue to sit and watch the sunrise together in silence. Newt ignores the nagging feeling in his chest.

“In the olden days –” Minho begins from the back seat, having to shout over the wind.

“You mean last year?” Gally cuts in.

Minho’s face is pinched in the rear-view mirror, “Yeah, last year. Don’t interrupt me. Anyway –” Newt and Thomas share a look up front, “On the street, Newt and I use to play this game – Do you remember? We’d compete to see who could clear a place the fastest.”

“Hey,” Newt says, opting to ignore the conversation to the best of his ability, “If we brought back spinach instead of kale, do you think Fry would know the difference?”

Thomas squints over at the shopping list, “The fuck is kale?”

In the back, Minho is unrelenting, “Newt.”

Newt sighs. “I always won,” he says, relaxing back into his seat.

Gally snorts. Minho looks affronted, “Um. No you didn’t. Your slow ass was always the last one out of there.”

Newt smirks and kicks both feet up on the dashboard. “Not anymore,” he says, rolling his right ankle proudly.

Minho does not look convinced in the slightest, “We’ll see about that. You wanna have a match?”

Gally laughs and one of Newt’s legs slips off the dash.

“What, now?” Newt asks, “_Here?_”

Minho shrugs, “Might be fun.”

“This …” Newt hesitates. Thomas’ eyes dart toward him for half a second, “This isn’t California anymore, Min. It’s certainly not some random warehouse. This is an actual _market_. If we get caught –”

“Then we’ll run before they can get our numbers,” Gally pipes in, unknowingly earning points with Minho. Newt can see his smug, grinning face in the mirror. “If we get out of there fast enough they won’t know who we are. But we won’t get caught, because we have these.” He waves the WCKD card in the air.

Newt feels stressed, “Guys –”

And that is when Thomas says, “I think it’ll be fun,” like the traitor that he is.

“What?” Newt stares at him.

Thomas keeps his eyes on the road, “Yeah,” he says, “If it’s a competition. Might be fun.”

“Didn’t peg you for the competitive type.”

Thomas shrugs and turns in to park on the side of the road. _Summerset Shopping Centre _beams at them in colourful holograms floating above their heads. City dwellers – _People_, Newt reminds himself, you_ are a city dweller now_ – dine and shop and walk about, happy and free.

“Dunno,” Thomas says, turning to face Newt, pushing his feet off the car, “Are we taking bets?”

From the back, Gally snorts loudly, “_Definitely_ didn’t peg you for the gambling type, happy farm.”

Minho elbows Gally in the ribs, “If I win I get your room.”

“What? No deal!”

Following Minho’s example, Thomas says to Newt, “If I win you have to drive us back to the house.”

Newt’s driving has actually improved over the last couple weeks, thank you very much, so Thomas’ proposal, no matter the intentions, is a piece of cake. Potentially. Newt weighs this up for a moment longer before agreeing.

“Alright. Sure. What if I win?”

“I’ll, um,” Thomas thinks. His cheeks are flushed from the heat. He shrugs, nonchalantly, “I’ll do whatever you want.”

Newt narrows his eyes, considering, and fights off the buzz in his chest before offering his hand to Thomas. “Okay. Deal,” he says and, ignores the boys pretending to gag in the back seat.

“Okay,” Gally says, pronounced like _oh-key, _“Rules are simple, first with a full cart wins.”

“Lame,” Minho scoffs, gripping the handle of his shopping cart like he’s revving a motorcycle. They’re standing in a line by the front of the store, trolleys poised ready to take off like race cars on a track. The looks they are receiving from both the security guard, front counter employee, and the little old lady squeezing the avocados makes Newt itchy.

Minho continues, “How are we going to know who filled their cart first? Nah, first through the registers and out into the parking lot wins.”

Newt feels himself begin to sweat. “We’re trying _not _to get arrested, Min,” he says. Minho scoffs and waves a hand in response. Newt worries that the good life has made him stupid.

“We take it easy,” Thomas says, “Don’t run. Don’t draw attention to yourself, just. Move fast.”

Gally snorts, leaning down over his cart, long legs stretching in preparation. “You’d know all about taking it easy, wouldn’t you, happy farm?”

Thomas pointedly does not respond.

Newt taps the bar impatiently, “Can we just hurry up and do this?”

Minho leans around Gally to smirk at him, “Worried about burning daylight, Newtie?”

Newt resists the powerful urge to poke his tongue out, “Worried about you having to sleep on the roof for a week. But it might be fun, you know? Organic bird shit alarm clock and unfortunate sunburns,” he says, reminding him of the terms of Gally’s deal.

Minho instantly sobers. “Let’s do this.”

“Hey,” Thomas leans over to Newt, “You haven’t told us what’ll happen if you win.”

“No,” Newt agrees, “I like keeping you bastards on your toes.”

They stand there a moment later, being side-eyed by customers, until Gally counts backward from five and they are off, running despite everything that had been discussed just before. Newt hits the bread first, grabbing this and that detailed in a combination of Teresa’s tall, almost clinical scrawl and Frypan’s proud loops. Through the crumpets he sees Thomas on the other side of the aisle inspecting a tub of strawberries, frowning slightly in his quest to find the most vibrant group of the bunch.

He can’t help the smile which tugs at his face, nor the need to nudge the stand until Thomas starts and looks up, seeing Newt through the small gaps.

“Slow and steady, Tommy?”

Thomas flips him off and throws the pack he holds in his hand into the basket, rushing off. Newt smirks and rushes to grab two bottles of milk (_Just plastic will do, the cheap stuff,_ Fry had said, bent over to counter for a final scan of the list, _None of that biodegradable shit. If folks are so worried about the planet maybe they shouldn’t have dumped nuclear waste into the ocean, to begin with_) and nearly runs into Minho at the entry to produce.

Ahead Gally is bustling around, throwing food into his cart without a single care to actually check what they are first. Down by the nuts, Minho doesn’t look like he is faring much greater. Newt feels confident about the number of items in his cart until he spots Thomas’, and his stomach instantly drops. The worst part is that he doesn’t even appear to be rushing. Newt feels the phantom sensation of the wind in his hair and the steering wheel beneath his palms and shudders, hurrying up.

By the greens: “Hey, happy farm!” Gally shouts, from the other side of the produce section, “You want some green beans? Helps the digestive system, keep those lungs healthy.”

Newt saddles his cart up beside Thomas’ and says, “I think he has a crush on you,” and revels in the horrified look that follows.

Newt and Minho make it to the registers simultaneously, much to their dismay. As Newt glares at the back of the customer before him, as if he would be able to telepathically influence them to hurry up, he briefly wonders where Thomas and Gally are. In line for the next register over, Minho hops back and forth on his feet. Newt doesn’t know if it is eagerment or if he just really needs the bathroom.

Newt shines with a smattering of prideful malice when his customer finishes up before Minho’s, and pushes the cart down the conveyor belt with nothing to lose. The checkout girl – mint hair, about Newt’s age, nametag reading _Zoey_, eyes cloudy like she is counting the minutes to the end of her shift – slides all of the items onto the podium with no words exchanged, that is until the belt is empty and Newt hands over the WCKD card.

“Oh,” She gasps, staring at the obnoxiously flashy, pearlescent card strangely, “You’re a _Donor_.”

She says the word as if it left a strange taste on his tongue. Behind him, the sound of Minho throwing items onto the conveyor belt – ignoring the complaints from the cashier – pauses. 

“Yes?”

“Huh.” Is all she says, after a beat, checking the card once more a moment longer before finally bringing it over to the sensor, and scanning. Newt almost didn’t expect it to work. 

Thinking that were the end of it, Newt begins loaded the bagged groceries back into his cart systematically, stacking them like blocks to avoid any damage, but just as Zoey is printing out his receipt, Newt hears, “So what was it like selling your entire body for a billion dollars?” and everything in him grows cold.

Newt is in no way a particularly shy person – never has been and probably never will. There is no room for that when you have spent most of your life sleeping under bridges and most often than not an angry, seven-foot-tall man stands between you and your next meal. But right now the old man at register 6 and the little girl in line for 8 are staring at him, as well as a family two registers over and the security guard, peering at him sternly behind blackout frames, and Newt feels fidgety. He wants nothing more in this moment than to retreat into a dark and soundless place where no one will know he is there.

Newt feels the invisible title – _DONOR _– floating above his head like one of those spinning, holographic signs out the front of the mall.

Zoey continues, “That’s about how much they gave you, isn’t it?” She’s still holding on to the card, spinning it with one corner indenting into her pointer finger, “Instead of using those funds to help people who are starving, or injured, or dying, they just let you live up on one of those three-story mansions on Paradise Hill for spitting into a tube.” One sharp eyebrow raises, “That’s you guys, right?”

Before Newt can answer, or his brain can relaunch itself out of whatever error code it has fallen into, he hears, “Hey, sweetheart,” and turns to see Minho suddenly beside him, full cart at his hip and arms crossed. Three registers over, finally, he sees Gally, who is watching the display with sharp eyes. Still no sign of Thomas.

“Yeah, that is us,” Minho continues, “Not that it’s any of your business. Now could you hurry it up? We got a car outside burning oil and distributing fossil fuel, turning the sky a, erm,” he pretends to squint up at the sky through the window, “A slightly shittier shade of brown. Hey, Newt, would you call that bronze or tan?”

Minho and Zoeyd compete in a staring competition for a brief moment following, her eyes boring sharply into Minho’s, as if she could slice the smile off his face with only a look. Eventually this ends, and she hands both the receipt and card back to Newt, says, “Your friend’s outside, by the way. You guys lost. _Next!_”

Thomas is waiting by the front entryway, coughing into his sleeve.

They gape at him.

Thomas blinks back in confusion.

“What?” He asks, sniffling loudly, “You guys okay?”

“The fuck!” Minho shouts, “Fucking gremlin! Where did you come from?”

Thomas shrugs innocently, “I’ve been here a while. You guys are slow. Also,” he notions to his cart, “The rules were ‘fill your cart’. No one said it had to be a lot.”

Minho peers into Thomas’ cart with irritated contemplation. “Hm,” he grunts before reaching out a messing Thomas’ hair even more, “Looks like you do have a brain in there. Who would’ve thought?”

Thomas rolls his eyes and pushes Minho’s arm away. “What happened in there? I thought I saw – ”

“Nothing,” Newt cuts in before Thomas can finish, trying his best to flash a smile, “Don't worry about it.”

When Thomas looks to Minho, hoping for a different answer, he simply shrugs, “What he said.”

“Shit,” they hear, and turn to watch Gally push his trolley through the automatic doors, face downturned in dismay, “Alright, that’s it. I want a rematch next week.”

“Damn it,” Thomas collapses backward on to Newt’s bed with something between a groan and a sigh, bouncing a little as he hits the mattress. Newt falls with him, only just managing to keep his knees and elbows from jabbing something vital. The sheets are cool when they touch his heated skin, flushed and sensitive. The alcohol in Newt’s system makes everything feel lucid and cloudy, his skin far too sensitive.

The next morning, when Newt could hopefully see straight again, he vows to sit Gally in a chair and force him to take Newt through each and every ingredient he threw in there.

Tomorrow, though. Now, he couldn’t care less. Now, his limbs feel heavy and his head pleasantly light. Now, Thomas laughs, soft and airy, and presses his wrist to his own forehead, clammy and glistening with tiny beads of sweat. His skin is flushed and his eyes shine bright, blinking unfocused on the ceiling of Newt’s bedroom.

Newt takes one last look, longer than he should have been able to get away with, to be completely honest (small inebriated miracles) and rolls off to collapse on his back on the plush sheets beside Thomas.

Thomas hums and kicks himself further up the bed, leaving his feet to dangle lazily off the side. Newt does the same, groaning with exertion, which for some reason makes Thomas giggle. The sound is endearing and charming and he wants to hear it again.

Rolling on his side to face Newt, Thomas asks, “Is the room spinning for you, too?”

“Uh,” Newt stops to think, looking about the room a moment in scientific contemplation before concluding that, yeah, it is. He says so. Thomas hums again, arm reaching out sluggishly until the palm of his his hand rests easily in the centre of Newt’s chest, warm.

“Good,” he says, “I was worried it was just me.”

Newt snorts, quietly, “You were worried _you _were spinning? Don’ worry, I’d let you know if that was happening.”

“No?” Thomas sounds confused, “No, I meant I – Ah. Jokes.” He flicks Newt in the stomach, but it is weak. His thumb catches on one of the buttons and remains there. Newt’s entire self buzzes.

Downstairs there is the sound of a crash, followed by a squeal from Sonya and a happy shout from Brenda, probably, which then leads into a mix of groans and cheers from the rest of the party.

Newt groans with them. “You think they’ll shut up soon?” he asks, head beginning to throb already. He’d escaped into the kitchen when they began taking bets on whether or not Jeff and Winston (gone for a drive around the city) were hooking up. He met Thomas in there, sat up on the counter, daydreaming as he stared into the pale amber of his drink, heels kicking the cabinet doors.

Newt knocked on the quartz to gain his attention, and they spent the rest of their time weaving through easy conversation and drinking, until Thomas hopped down from the counter and landed funny on his feet, swaying off-kilter and wobbly-kneed. Newt slung an arm around his waist and Thomas allowed his forehead to drop against Newt’s shoulder, and together they struggled up the stairs like a strange, four-legged animal.

Now, Thomas shakes his head a little too enthusiastically, “Not likely.”

“Should’ve picked up earplugs from the store.”

“Don’t like a lot of noise?” Thomas asks.

Newt sighs, and after a beat, says, “Noise was my alarm clock for years. The sound of Minho’s boots against the dirt meant get up. The sound of a siren mean _get the fuck up_. Voices outside meant always get ready to leave, or hide, or run, or turn into a bloody gecko and camouflage yourself to the wall.”

Thomas listens to his words intently, thumb and forefinger unconsciously twisting the button. “How long were you …?”

He doesn’t need Thomas to finish the sentence. Newt talks, tongue looser than it has been in years, “My parents … left when I was about ten. I was on my own for a while before I met Minho.”

Thomas frowns, “Why’d they leave?”

Newt’s breath catches in his throat when, in the back corners of his memory, where the cobwebs sit and spiders crawl as a warning sign, he hears the door slamming open, his father’s voice, his mother’s frightened whisper and then the low, chilling drawl of a stranger reading out his father’s number. Newt touches his shoulder, tracing over the four crescent moon scars where his mother’s nails dug into his skin and drew blood when they dragged her away from him.

Thomas pulls on the button. Newt looks to him once again and does his best to make the smile on his face fill his eyes. He shrugs in answer to Thomas’ question, finally, and says nothing else.

He hoped that would be the end of it, but now Thomas is looking at him with sharp eyes, more alert than they have any right to be, parted lips and the beginnings of a crease between his eyebrows, and Newt feels all too transparent. Newt can see it growing, he can feel the words forming on Thomas’ tongue like a storm cloud beginning to swell, and he thinks – he thinks _maybe_, maybe if he were to roll over, just a bit (it wouldn’t need to be much) and close his mouth over Thomas’ then _maybe _it would stop him from saying, “It’s okay, Newt.”

He stays exactly where he is as if pinned to the sheets by an invisible force.

“It’s okay. I’m sorry that happened,” Thomas continues, and his fingers continue to twist the button on Newt’s shirt, and he thinks, _Maybe I should do it anyway_. “It shouldn’t have happened. Not to them, or anyone. But we’re here now,” he whispers, “We’re okay.”

And.

And Newt’s ears fill with static, and he thinks, _okay_. And Thomas’ hand lingers on his chest.

And Newt says, “I’m tired,” lips moving on autopilot. He watches Thomas watching him, sees a million thoughts drifting in and out of his mind, “Think I’ll just go to sleep.”

Rolling over to face the opposite wall, Newt waits for no response from Thomas, and neither does he receive one. He dozes off to the sound of their friends below and Thomas’ soft breathing. In the morning, when Newt wakes to bright sunlight through the open curtains, the way he always does, Thomas is gone. The sheets beside him are rumpled, and Newt feels the phantom warmth of his touch on his skin.

“If you could be anywhere in the world right now, where would you be?” Sonya’s bare foot revolves in slow circles, ankle resting on her knee. Spread out on the floor, the girls lie in a circle with their heads together, legs facing outward like a flower. The skylight above paints them in pale, liquid gold.

Brenda raises her eyebrow at the question and Harriet half-heartedly rolls her eyes. It is Teresa who asks, “Pre-dust or post?”

“Like any of us actually know what a pre-dust Earth was like,” Brenda murmurs, playing with the loose thread of her cut-off shorts.

Harriet shrugs, “I don’t know, I’ve got a pretty good imagination.”

“Pre,” Sonya answers, “No dust. If there never was any dust.”

Brenda scoffs, “Now, there’s a concept.”

“Somewhere with water,” Teresa says, fiddling with her hair and picking off a split end, “But not a port. A beach. The countryside. Maybe Italy, I think, or Greece.”

From the couch, face in a book and furiously trying to ignore the conversation but, at the same time, much too crabbed to move, Newt thinks _Greece is one giant liquid reactor and the grapes in Italy shrivel in the summer and turn to poison in the winter_, but he does not say that out loud.

“Maybe Switzerland,” Harriet says, “I’d like to see the snow.”

“Eugh,” Brenda groans, “No.”

“What?” Sonya tilts her head back to look at Brenda. Newt has no idea if she actually can or is just pretending to, “You _enjoy _the eternal summer?”

“With ice your temperature drops until your body eventually shuts down, putting you to sleep. But you don’t die, oh no, you gotta wait a bit first. But you’d be stuck. At least with heat you ‘ve somewhat more of a chance of surviving.”

“Dark,” Teresa says, “But at least you’d just, you know, fall asleep. Heat will dehydrate you to nothing, and it would hurt. A lot.”

“Hey, guys,” Harriet pipes in, with a strange twist in her voice, “What the actual shit are we talking about right now?”

Ignoring her, Sonya says, “I’d take the ice,” and shouts when Harriet punches her in the shoulder, kicking back over Brenda’s, “Children settle!”.

Suddenly, just when he had begun to believe they were quietening down, Newt hears his name called. He looks up to find Teresa’s piercing blue gaze on him, searching. “Back to our previous discussion, where would you most like to be?”

The rest of the girls join in and look over as well. Newt sinks further into the cushions, “Anywhere but here, right now.” He receives a _look_. Then, “I don’t know. Nowhere.”

“Nowhere?” Sonya repeats, face screwing up.

Newt reaches out and smacks her foot with his. “Yeah, I don’t know,” he says, as Sonya rubs her ankle with a frown, “I like it here. Why, is that weird?”

“No, it’s not weird,” Brenda says.

And then, Teresa goes and says, “Hard Rock or Callisto?” and all the air is stolen from the room.

Four pairs of eyes on him, some unsure, some curious, Newt thinks for only a moment. “One’s not an option,” he says.

Sonya frowns, “Why?”

“Because,” Newt closes the book. He’d lost his page, anyway, “Because. We don’t know what Callisto is like – _will be _like.”

“Utopia,” Harriet murmurs.

“Supposed utopia,” Newt corrects. “It could all go to shit, and we will never know. The project could fail, humans might never make it there. And if they did, maybe they don’t do better. Maybe they’ll fuck up the moon like they did here. Maybe we’ll fuck up the whole galaxy.”

“A world with clean air. Everywhere.” Teresa sits up, “You wouldn’t want that?”

“Of course I want that. I ...” Newt pauses. “I want that for here. Now. Not on some rock in the sky that none of us will ever see.”

Minho and Thomas begin to run together. Newt is struggling to decide whether it is a means for Teresa to vicariously keep an eye on him and make sure he doesn’t pass out in the middle of the street to be left for the vultures, or simply the innocent product of a mutual interest. Either way, the overall concept bothers Newt more than it probably should.

They return in the mornings, happy and flushed, joking and shoving at each other boyishly – Minho’s arm around Thomas’ shoulders and Thomas’ hand on his bicep – while Newt sits at the kitchen table with his tea and pretends not to notice until both or one of them enters the room. He says no when they invite him to join, and it is petty, yes, he understands, but. WCKD may have fixed his leg and the pain may be gone physically, but sometimes memories are louder than reality, and no surgery can heal the phantom electricity that shoots up Newt’s leg when he steps too hard or runs too fast.

(Last week, Minho challenged both Newt and Thomas to a race to the end of the street and back, which they both accepted. Newt got as far as the tenth house before Minho veered too hard to the left, suddenly, and Newt was forced to swerve out of the way. The action caused his foot to twist, muscles working to jump out of the way, and left him on the ground at the memory of the burning fire rushing up his leg.

They knelt by him and fussed over him like two doting parents, and it took Newt ten minutes to convince them that he really was fine.) 

So he continues to say no, and continues to be profoundly bitter about it while denying the fact like it is his dying will and testament. Newt resides himself to waiting on the porch with cold bottles of water for when they get back, like the den-mother he feels he might have been in another life.

Newt previously imagined he has been subtle, with the way he watches Thomas at every opportunity he could, but apparently this is not the case.

On a particularly windy Tuesday night Minho, spread out lazily in a bean bag, says to Newt, “So, what’s going on with you and Thomas?” and Newt tries not to choke on his water.

“What?” he coughs, wiping at his mouth, “Nothing?”

“Yeah,” Minho says, tone dripping with purpose, leaning over his knees and levelling Newt with a wide-eyed, serious stare, “That’s exactly the point. What’s happening?”

“Nothing is happening!”

Minho throws his arms out, leaving Newt to wonder how long he has been sitting on this for. “Exactly! Again!” Minho cries, “It’s been four months! I’ve had to watch you drool over each other like dogs for months, wondering why you don’t just go for it. And then!” He becomes more animated by the second, “_And then_. You losers waddle upstairs, hanging off of each other like a couple of newlyweds – no, fuck _you_ – and I thought, damn, he really does have it in him. Who would’ve thought, right? But nope. Still nope.”

Minho takes a deep breath, before continuing, “So why not?”

“What do you mean, why not?”

“What,” Minho’s expression shifts, “do _you _mean?”

Newt takes a beat to allow to moment to simmer in the present, just in case Minho might suddenly catch up. He doesn’t.

Newt sighs and forces down the ugly pull of his internal organs when he tells Minho, “I mean, Thomas and Teresa are together. So nothing can happen.”

The penny takes it’s time to drop in Minho’s eyes, and when it does his eyes widen, eyebrows raising, and he all of a sudden looks as if he doesn’t quite know what to do with his entire body. “Oh,” he says, “Oh … Uh.”

Newt frowns, mimicking, “Uh?”

“That. Is that. Is.” Minho struggles, pressing his hands together between his knees, “Is that the story, is it?”

“What do you mean, is that the story?” Newt says, “What are you talking about?”

Minho is staring at Newt with narrowed eyes. While Newt sits patiently and awaits the punchline, the penny drops once more and Minho shoots to attention, “Right! Of course. You know – never mind. Wow. Um. Damn, you’re right. Bummer. Hey,” he stands, “I gotta go do something, so.” Two fingered salute, “Later.”

He leaves, little fast, calculated steps with his shoulders shaking. Newt remains where he is for the next ten minutes, furiously trying to draw some sense out of everything that just happened.

Thomas’ hand always travels lower in his dreams. In his mind the colours of the sunset bend and shift around Thomas, as it drapes over the both of them like a blanket, feather-soft and ephemeral.

On his skin he feels the ghost of Thomas’ breath beneath his ear, the weight of him atop of Newt’s chest, long fingers twisting the button back and forth. In his mind Thomas always rolls closer until Newt feels the weight of him against his body and the warmth of his skin through their clothing. The button pops loose, and the wind brushes against the window, singing like wind chimes, and Thomas’ palm moves slowly downwards while his lips trace the edge of Newt’s jaw.

Newt will wake gasping and too-hot, not quite sure of reality for a few pounding heartbeats, or he will get himself off and feel guilty about it after, laying against the sweat-drenched bed sheets. The cold morning light settles on top of him and birds chip outside, laughing.

A piano melody, soft and timid, like cautious tiptoeing down a quiet hall in the middle of the night, fills Newt’s ears. Blinking smoky afternoon light out of his eyes, he pushes himself up on two shaky elbows, and proceeds to blink around his bedroom precariously, gently tilting his head side to side to test it out. It doesn’t hurt too badly. As it turns out, stubbornly sleeping off a hangover is one on his short list of talents.

Last night, Minho had the great idea that he and Newt swindle their way into a liquor store and steal a few bottles. Why? If Newt had thought for one single moment he would get a straight answer, he would have bothered asking. It was a success, they even bought a cheap cart of beer just to keep up appearances – which was Newt’s idea. Minho rolled his eyes at him and told him he had gotten soft – and slyly brought the collection home to a group of all too appreciative teenagers. Newt has to wonder why they still do this, but then again, thinking of Brenda, the only one of them actually old enough to purchase alcohol legally, doing so leaves a strange sour flavour in his mouth.

Newt is so used to random parties whenever one or most of them feel like it, so he hadn’t realised there was an actual occasion until about three drinks in. Minho had slung his arm around Newt’s shoulders and announced it to the group, wide smile, and planting a sloppy kiss to his forehead. He blacked out after X amount of drinks, and whoever dragged his sloppy ass to bed had apparently taken off one shoe before giving up. Newt kicks the other off and slowly swings himself out of bed.

Padding down the stairs half alive is a familiar tune Newt knows well, thin blanket wrapped snug around his shoulders because it is _finally_ beginning to cool, following the sound of the piano. 

The line of Thomas’ shoulders is the first thing that he sees as he rounds the corner, past the peering column and into the wide-open space. Seated before a grand white piano, back neither hunched nor stiff, his fingers dance in a slow, easy waltz across the keys. The wall-sized window overexposes the room in a collection of asymmetrical rectangles.

Thomas looks content enough inside of his own world that Newt contemplates interrupting him at all, or if it would be better than standing there and watching him like a creep, in the long run. The former eventually wins, and in the brief interlude between the current song ending and the next beginning, when Thomas reaches forward to turn to the next song in the book, Newt decides to approach.

“That sounded good,” he says, allowing the blanket to fall off his shoulders, and draping it over the back of one of the fifty random sofas in the house, each turned on a slight angle toward nothing, before coming to sit beside Thomas. “I didn’t know you could play.”

Thomas looks a little like a shocked deer. “Hi. Morning. Uh, yeah, I mean.” He shrugs, “It’s nothing, really.”

Newt rolls his eyes and elbows him. “Sure. Keep going. Don’t stop on my account.”

For a second Newt thinks Thomas might refuse, but then he turns forward again, hands hovering unsure above the keys as he eyes the sheet music. Above the dozens of little symbols Newt doesn’t understand are the words _Clair de Lune_ written in broad, swirly script. He begins to play. For the next few minutes Newt finds himself constantly torn between watching every single movement of Thomas’ fingers across the keys, and closing his eyes and allowing himself to be swept up in the music. The gentle notes paint a picture in his mind; rolling hills, purple skies, pink and orange and blue crystals made of ice. A warm breeze over an ocean that shines like diamonds. He thinks, maybe this is what Callisto will feel like.

Thomas’ voice cuts over the melody, barely missing a note. He says, “It’s a big one today.”

Newt waits a bit to see if there is a second half of that statement that would help with context. There isn’t.

“What is?” he asks.

Thomas frowns. “The storm outside?” He motions for Newt to look behind them with a short tilt of his head. Newt follows the direction and, sure enough, outside the very large, unmissable window is an even larger, more unmissable dust storm sweeping across the open desert plain. The sight of it immediately launches Newt’s heart up into his throat, and all attempts to quell his reaction misses the mark by a mile, and Thomas definitely does not miss the sharp intake of breath and the slide back into the piano.

He stops playing, the sound cutting too sharply and leaving the room with a dull, throbbing noise, placing a hand on Newt’s knee.

“Hey.” His voice is as quiet as it usually is, but softer now, “I know, it’s intense. I reacted the same when I came down here. But we’re safe in here. Crazy, isn’t it?” 

_Yes, _Newt thinks, _it is. _After years of running from storms such as this one, it feels wrong and dangerous to just remain where he is. By now he would be waking Minho, or Minho would be waking him, and they would pack up as fast as they could with as little as possible so not to slow them down.

“Bloody hell …” Newt breathes. He swings his legs over the bench to get a better look. Thomas does the same.

“Tell me about it. Never seen one before. Not properly, at least. Back at the community, we had these underground bunkers built for situations just like that one,” Thomas says. He looks at Newt, “You ever been close to one of those?” Newt shakes his head. “I have. They’re loud. Louder than you’d expect. When it’s right above you, it’s just this noise like thunder and lightning and rain and wind all at once, and each one is trying to be louder than the other. It turns into this eternal roar that goes on for hours. You wonder if it’s ever going to be quiet again.”

Thomas turns to meet Newt’s eyes, which are wide and transfixed. “Don’t recommend.”

Newt scoffs. “Well drat, I was going to ask if you wanted to go for a drive.”

Thomas smirks. “Are you the one driving?”

“Fuck no.” He says, and then, “Maybe later.”

“It’s a date, then.”

Newt focuses on the dust storm, eyes locked forward, unthinking. There’s something otherworldly transfixing about it, the goliath form and organic shape, the destructive path it leads through the desert. Watching it from this far away, knowing full well that nothing or no one is in any kind of danger, it is almost beautiful.

Thomas clears his throat, not in the way he usually does, and says, “Happy birthday, by the way. Sorry I didn’t come down yesterday. My lungs decided they already had other plans.”

Newt knows. He had wandered upstairs sometime last night, looking for Thomas all the while convincing himself he wasn’t. He heard him throwing up in one of the bathrooms, Teresa’s gentle voice murmuring reassurances.

“I guess I forgive you,” he says, grinning. Thomas grins back. “When did you learn to play?”

“Uh,” Thomas scratches his ear, “A few years ago. They had this super old grand piano in the theatre hall of the main building. When I was bored I’d sit at the keys and press each one until eventually something came out that wasn’t completely awful.”

He sees Newt staring at him and flushes a little, admitting, “There wasn’t a lot to do in the off-season.”

Newt shakes his head, “That’s amazing,” he says, both to the story and because he had no idea deserts even had an _on_-season. Thomas shrugs modestly. “So you can just look at one of these and just play it?”

Thomas shrugs again. Humming, Newt snatches the book and begins to flip through, frowning at all the little black balls on sticks that make absolutely no sense to him but somehow mean _something_ to Thomas. He finally stops at one titled _Dream A Little Dream Of Me_ and places it back on the stand in front of Thomas.

“Play this one,” Newt says. Thomas stares at him, dubiously, for one long moment before giving in.

He begins slow, more curious than unsure, eyes trained more on the page than the keys as he gathers his bearings, and then thirty seconds in he is playing as if he’s known this melody his entire life. Newt is enthralled with every note and movement of his fingers across the piano. At one point through the song Thomas closes his eyes and moves with the music, easy and fluid. After a while he finishes, and Newt’s heart is suddenly beating too fast. Right now, he could lean in and kiss him and it would be the easiest thing in the world.

”Tommy,” he says, voice not sounding like his own, and when Thomas turns to him, forgets how to breathe. He is close. _Very_ close. Closer than he realised. Close enough that Newt can see the faint dusting of freckles across his cheeks, the flecks of grey and brown in his eyes, the uneven tan across his collarbones from all the morning runs. His eyes search and his lips part in question, and a million emotions run through Newt as Thomas leans forward. The wind picks up outside, wildly, and the clock above the stairs chimes six o’clock, but in the end, it is their fingertips touching on the bench that wakes Newt up.

He leans back.

Thomas blinks and looks away, sliding further down the bench until there is nowhere else to go, and Newt wants to rip his hair out.

“I should,” Newt begins, “go and check on Minho.”

Thomas coughs and clears his throat. He is staring at the keys, “He went down to the springs with Sonya and Gally about three hours ago.”

_Oh_. “Right,” Newt mumbles. “Good.”

Thomas nods and Newt wishes he was anywhere else. Thomas says nothing else and eventually, Newt mutters something about grabbing something to eat, and stands up and leaves. Thomas is rolling the corner of a page between his fingers when Newt looks back.

Outside, the storm rages on.

Newt finds it difficult to look Teresa in the eye for the rest of the week, while Thomas refuses to meet his. In the aftermath of what happened, Newt sticks by Minho more than usual. Accompanying him on trips down to the village, walks around the block, or literally anything else he can think of sans following him to the bathroom – which, Newt is sure, Minho assumes is a reality at this point. If he thinks or knows something is going on, he doesn’t say. When Minho is otherwise occupied for a large amount of time – i.e., morning runs – he’ll hang around Sonya or watch Fry bake and Winston attempt to help him while Jeff sits back and laughs, or bother Gally.

This morning, he finds Brenda out on the back patio, deep in concentration as she dismantles a sun lounge. Its twin sits precariously to the left, awaiting its inevitable fate.

Brenda spots him as he skids to a stop, a foot away from ramming his shin into one of the sharp metal rods sticking out chaotically.

“Oh,” Brenda begins, removing a screwdriver from her mouth, smiling up at him pleasantly, “Hey, Newt.”

“Hi, uh.” He blinks, “What are you doing?”

“I’m trying to build an antenna,” she says, with the casual decadence of someone discussing the chance that it might rain later this afternoon. 

“Oh.” Newt thinks, _of course, what else_. “Why?”

Brenda merely shrugs, dropping another two screws, “There’s no signal all the way up here. I kind of miss the radio, you know? Plus, I’ve never, like.” Three more screws, one nail, which makes a horrible screeching sound as it resists, “I’ve never watched TV. You know just sitting around with a group of people, and –” She shakes her head. “It’s whatever. I’m bored. Harriet and Sonya are off making googly eyes at each other and Thomas is monopolizing Teresa, and who the fuck knows where any of the boys are, so.”

She spins the screwdriver around her fingers.

Newt crouches down to her level. “It is too quiet up here,” he agrees. “Do you want any help?”

Brenda’s eyebrows raise in surprise. “Oh. Yeah, sure. You don’t have anything else to do?”

Before, he planned to grab one of the bikes out of the garage and see how long he could last before the phantom pains in his leg returned, but as he was approaching Thomas had been getting out of one of the Jeeps, so he turned and left. Rather than admitting this to Brenda, Newt says, “No. Nothing,” and accepts the offered screwdriver.

Dismantling a sun lounge is a lot harder than it appears, and this one protests severely. By the end of it, they have a pile of scrapped and ruined fabric, three neat rows of metal rods in various sizes and shapes, and a bandage on Newt’s wrist from where he cut himself on the sharp edge of one of the rods halfway through. Newt grabs his designated pile of rods and follows Brenda to the roof where, up until this point, he had just assumed Brenda knew what she was doing with all these haphazard scraps of metal, and never bothered to ask otherwise.

Now, watching her knelt in the center of a circle of rods as the sun sets on the horizon, brow furrowed and irritatingly wounding her ponytail up into a tight knot, he isn’t so sure.

“I saw my uncle do this when I was a kid,” she explains, “Even helped him a couple of times. But, you know, he was an engineer, so there were never any instructions.”

Newt chews his lip, “Do you think you can replicate it?”

Brenda sucks her teeth, and then stands, picking up the roll of tape she’d stolen from somewhere. “Shouldn’t be too hard.”

Sometime after they’ve installed the absolute pinnacle of modern art on the rooftop, Newt stands in front of a small radio which had previously remained untouched on the kitchen island and watches, stunned, as it, by some miracle, begins to sing. Brenda throws her fists in the air and shouts, then hugs Newt. Newt wonders whether she fell into black waters when she was young and afterward developed superpowers, like in the old comics his father would read to him as a child. 

Jeff’s words as he, Winston and Frypan return, obviously not hearing the music, is, “Hey, I don’t know if you know this, but there’s this giant metal thing on the roof that looks like it’s in pain.”

Brenda’s response is the turn the volume up higher. The boys are silent for only a breath before the realisation hits.

“Holy shit!” Fry laughs gleefully as Winston says, “Oh thank god – I thought we were getting probed.”

The television only picks up free for air, as expected; the old forgotten channels which still exist on some lost frequency and go on unnoticed. The picture is rough and unclear but it’s enough. They all sit around the living room, watching an old sit-com their grandparents’ grandparents probably enjoyed, listening to gags and jokes they don’t understand while a laugh track plays over the background, gleeful and comfortable, and lounging around in their pajamas. Looking around the room and seeing everyone’s faces, chatting and joking and laughing along to Minho attempting to imitate every single character on the show, Newt could honestly say he has never felt happier than this moment. 

The full moon reflects off the water of the swimming pool, and the lights turn it a ghostly pale green. Newt sits by the edge with his ankles in the cool water, enjoying the feeling of it against his skin, leaning back on his palms and turns his eyes toward the night sky. It is clearer than usual tonight, and a small collection of stars peek through successfully, though not very bright. Even all the way up here they aren’t spared the pollution and vapour clouds. Newt remembers how they looked out in the desert on warm nights, how they shone down with no qualms or diffidence, unapologetically bright. It might be the only thing he missed about the deserts.

The tranquil silence of the night perfectly parallels the muffled shouts of his friends behind the heavy glass doors. Their commotion serves as soothing background noise for Newt, to accompany the gentle thrum of the pool filter and the calls of coyotes and owls in the far distance. He closes his eyes and allows it all to consume him for a moment.

When he was a child, he and his parents holed up in a small cabin in remote Washington for a month this one year. It sat on the outskirts of a lake, overlooking a steep valley below. Some nights, when father would let him sleep in the larger room while he and mother locked themselves in the only bedroom, he would sneak out late at night, sure they were too distracted to hear him.

The nights were a light show out there, the chemical clouds turning the midnight sky an array of colours. He knows mother would have a fit if he stayed out there too long, especially with no mask, so he never lingered. But in those rare moments, as short as they were, it was just Newt and a forest painted in every single colour that ever existed.

Newt opens his eyes.

His father would have hated the desert. His mother would just be telling how stupid he is to be here, right now. Her voice whispers to him to grab his pack and run, in the early morning so not to draw attention.

He kicks the water, relishing in the loud splash of the waves wiping them both away. For a moment he almost feels the ghost of his mother’s nails on the back of his neck, drawing him in close to speak into his ear. He has gone almost three months without their voices in the back of his mind, and he sure as hell isn’t about to let them come back now.

The heavy pull of the patio door opening misses his ears completely, and Newt does not realise he has company until he hears, “Mind if I join you?” behind him.

Thomas stands above him. Newt remains perfectly neutral and shakes his head, shuffling over on the edge of the pool.

Thomas sits with a small huff, loud in the quiet. Inside, everyone has moved further into the house.

“Nice out, tonight,” Thomas says after a long minute of silence. His feet pad in the water.

“It is,” Newt agrees, and because they’re already talking about the weather, adds, “It’s always nice here. Well, most of the time.”

Thomas nods, humming. “Don’t trust it?”

Newt scoffs. “Not at all.”

Beside him, Thomas grins. “I know how you feel,” he says, “I keep waiting for an electric strike, or a hurricane or wind storm. It feels wrong for everything to be so calm. Don’t even get me started on the rain. That dust storm last week was the first time when things actually felt normal.”

With the subtle mention of last week and the dust storm, everything comes rushing back. 

Newt looks out at the water.

“Have you ever been in the middle of a nuclear storm?” Newt asks. Thomas lets go of a deep breath and shakes his head no.

“Those happen up near the border, right?” Thomas asks, “Washington and Montana?”

“Yeah,” Newt says, “It’s not like it is when it rains here. It’s hot. Like God’s upturned a galactic sized crockpot on everything. You run for cover as soon as it hits and if you can’t find a good enough spot, then. Well. See ya. The air stays like that for hours after. Hot. Everything feels too thick, and the air tastes burnt.

“The first time it rained when I was on my own, I’d been in California for about a month.” Newt pauses. Beside him, Thomas is listening attentively. Around them, the night goes on. He continues, “I freaked out, to put it lightly.” He remembers running under a pier and staying there for three whole days, nearly attacked by a wild dog on day two. Newt tells him this.

Thomas swears. “I get it,” he says, “The community was a lot to get used to, very fast. We used to live by Georgia before we moved there.”

“You and your mother?” Newt asks before he stops to wonder if Thomas knows he knows about his mother. However, he just nods.

“To go from all trees to none was … Very weird. Hey,” Thomas says, “Is it true everything glows after a nuclear storm?”

Newt blinks in surprise at the genuine, wide-eyed curiosity in Thomas’ eyes, and feels his lips stretch into a helpless smile, “All the water. Like fireflies.”

Thomas’ eyebrows raise in awe, and he breathes, “Damn. I’d like to see that.”

Newt nearly chokes on air, he is so affronted.

“No. You _wouldn’t_.”

Thomas shrugs with his entire body, attempting to save himself, “I mean! If I had, you know, proper shelter and all that. It’d be cool.”

“Cool?” Newt wants to throw him in the pool, “Did you not hear a word I just said? It won’t be cool, it’ll be like standing in a sauna, you – you know what, I don’t know why I’m even bothering.”

Thomas fights back a broad grin, “Hey, now –”

“No, no, you’re a lost cause. I’m sorry, Tommy, but it’s time you heard the truth.”

Thomas’ jaw drops open, and for one terrifying second Newt fears he’s crossed a line until Thomas’ eyes narrow, and he shoves at Newt’s shoulder, quite nearly dislodging him into the pool. Newt doesn’t mind, though, because he is laughing, shaking his head in astonishment.

“Alright, alright,” Thomas says, “But is it any different to some of the days we’ve had here? Really?”

“Tell you what,” Newt stands. Thomas follows him with his eyes, “How about you take a short trip up to Washington and tell me all about it when you come back? I’d love to hear your thoughts. Take a book with you, we can compare notes.”

Thomas snorts, “Now who’s the scientist. Where’re you going?”

“Huh?” Newt blinks, hands on the button of his pants, “Oh, nowhere. I was going to jump in. Want to join me?” He adds on, completely self-ill-advised.

Thomas looks between Newt and the water for a moment before finally nodding, “Sure.”

Newt strips down to his boxers. It would be a good idea to run upstairs and grab swimming trunks, but. Thomas does the same, and Newt politely averts his eyes. He runs to the edge of the pool and jumps straight into the water, going for a cannonball which turns into a last-minute dive mid-air. It is very unfortunate and messy, and when he surfaces Thomas is laughing at him.

Thomas’ cheeks are flushed rosy, and he is without clothes; tan skin paled by the moonlight as the water paints him in silver-green. Newt half-wishes he stayed inside. As Thomas lingers by the edge of the pool, unsure, Newt mentally hits himself for not first checking if he even knows how, or can. Nevertheless, he wouldn’t mind wading water by the shallow end if that’s the case, but just as he is thinking this a large splash from the front of the pool draws his attention, and Newt turns just in time to see Thomas emerge from the water, shaking his hair out like a dog.

Some of the water hits Newt in the face and he splutters, and Thomas does it some more, most defiantly on purpose. Newt sends a wave toward him in revenge, but Thomas dives out of the way and evades it just in time. Newt is about to do it again when, as Thomas is doing a breaststroke to safety, his shoulder is perfectly exposed, as well as the six-digit number sitting innocently, out in the open for Newt to see.

Newt looks away, forgetting to tread water a moment and having to catch himself. His hand moves to his own shoulder where his number hides, as has hidden for months, behind a roll of gauze.

He shouldn’t look. And if he does, he should pretend he isn’t – it’s the politest thing to do. Adding to the five Newt has now spotted an eight, and a digit which could either be seven or two. 

“Swim a lot?” Thomas asks, swimming a small circle around Newt.

“Now, yeah.” Newt replies, turning around in the water to keep up, “Not in recent years, but when I was younger my parents and I used to live somewhere with a swimming pool right behind us.”

Thomas stops after his third lap to wade water. “You lived in a house, then?”

Newt nods and simply says, “Yes,” and because he can feel the next round of questions coming like a warning siren, he asks Thomas, “What about you? With the excess supply of waterholes in the desert.”

“Actually, since you mention it,” Thomas grins and rolls onto his back. Newt finds himself doing the same. “Yeah, there wasn’t many. Or at all. But what we did have was this giant water tank, where everyone got there water from. A few of us used to sneak in and swim around at night.”

Newt half rolls back up to face Thomas, or, rather, make sure he can see his horrified expression. “That sounds disgusting.”

Thomas grimaces at the stars. “Yeah, I know. Looking back, it was pretty gross, and more than a little invasive, to be completely honest. But no one thought about that at the time. But,” his hand traces patterns in the water, creating undulating currents which protrude outward from his skin like an aura. “It was the only time when we all felt free.” 

“The only time?”

“Hm?” Thomas blinks, then sobers, rolling back vertically again, and shaking his head, “Ah, no. Sorry, I had a shot of – something. Brenda made me drink this thing earlier, my head’s a little hazy.”

“Hey,” Thomas says, before Newt can speak, “You wanna play a game, or something?”

Newt rolls back upright also, intrigued, “Like what?”

“Who do you think can hold their breath the longest? You or me?”

Newt raises an eyebrow. They’re facing each other properly now, all of a foot of water between them, ad Thomas’ eyes are narrowed with competitive mirth. Newt thinks for only a moment and then says, “Okay. On three?”

Together they count to three, both taking a loud, deep breath at the last second before sinking down beneath the surface. In the end they last thirteen seconds (Newt 0.5 longer than Thomas, thank you very much) and Thomas has trouble staying under, and Newt may or may not allow his leg to accidentally kick out and brush his foot against Thomas’ stomach in a completely non-attempt to tickle him, and Thomas also may or may not have reached out to try and push Newt towards the surface. They both shoot to the top in an array of splutters and shouts, Newt shouting, “You tried to push me up!” over Thomas’, “You _tickled_ me!”

“It was an _accident!_” Newt says, through rolls of laughter. Thomas doesn’t look like he believes him much. “But now …”

Thomas squawks, “Don’t you dare!” and jumps out of the way of Newt’s fingers, which had just begun to wiggle dangerously toward his ribs. Newt laughs as his hand is slapped away, and a new wave of water is propelled at his face.

“Okay! I’ll stop.” Newt coughs, rubbing his eyes.

“Good.” Thomas says, then, “Race you to the end of the pool!”

And he takes off without a warning, catching Newt off guard and leaving him frozen dumb before his brain catches up. Newt shouts, “Hey!” and takes off after Thomas, arms and legs working fast but not fast enough, as Thomas reaches the end of the pool before he does, hand splayed flat on the tiles and grin bright with victory.

Newt slaps him on the shoulder when he comes up for air, flipping his hair out of his face with vehemence. His skin brushes the rough ink of Thomas’ numbers on accident. He scarcely notices.

“Dickhead!” Newt curses, “What the bloody hell what that?”

“Ah,” Thomas blinks innocently, “I don’t know, but it clearly looks like I beat you.”

Newt rolls his eyes, “Oh, you did not.”

“Sorry, didn’t I reach here –” he knocks on the tile “– before you? Wasn’t that the rules?”

Newt groans and presses his back against the cool tiles. His skin is heated from the sudden bout of exercise and adrenaline, and Thomas is still looking at him with that stupid grin he would love to wipe from his face. “Yeah,” he says, “Rules you made up before you just,” he makes a gesture with his hands. Not a good gesture, but one that gets the point across, nonetheless, “took off.”

“Fine,” Thomas sighs, threading his fingers through his hair and out of his eyes, “Once more. Fair this time, I swear. On three?”

Newt nods, and they position themselves against the pool wall, all ten fingers on the smooth tile. Thomas begins to count, “One. Two –”

“Three!” Newt pushes off the wall and dives, hearing Thomas shout right before he hits the water full force and takes off. He is proud to say that, this time around, he is the one to reach the end first as Thomas barrels in like a drunken seal behind him. Also, payback tastes _lovely_. 

Thomas surfaces and lands right against Newt. Skin on skin, Newt has no time to prepare before Thomas nearly coughs out a lung full of water, croaking, “You cheated!”

“You cheated first, you twat!” Newt rebuts, shoving Thomas back.

Thomas coughs out the last bit of water. He takes a deep breath. “Did not –”

Newt laughs. “Oh bullshit –”

“Whatever, you were playing dirty from the start.”

“_Riiight_. But of course,” Newt says, “I still win.”

“_Ugh_. Fine,” Thomas sighs, giving up, “Yeah, okay, you win.”

“I do?”

“You do.”

“Fantastic,” Newt grins, “What’s my prize?”

Thomas kisses him.

It is so sudden that Newt forgets he is supposed to close his eyes, or do something with his hands or body, or anything, really. A moment prior there had been cool, mountain air and Thomas, rolling his eyes and groaning at him, and then there is Thomas, all of Thomas, his hands on Newt’s hips, and his lips to Newt’s lips. It’s uneven; he should be tilting his head, but he doesn’t, and their noses don’t quite line up as they should, and when Thomas sucks lightly on his bottom lip Newt gasps.

Just as abruptly as it began it ends, as Thomas pulls himself away from Newt so fast Newt wonders if he’s stubbed his toe on something, or Newt has somehow drawn up some static electricity and Thomas has been shocked.

“Shit.” Thomas whispers so softly it is almost inaudible over the roaring in Newt’s ears. His hands hover an inch from Newt’s skin. “Shit, fuck. I’m so sorry.”

“Um,” Newt manages to croak.

Thomas’ hands move to his face, covering it. “I’m _so_ sorry,” he repeats, “I shouldn’t’ve – _fuck_.”

“Thomas,” Newt starts.

“Listen, just.” Thomas removes his hands from his face, and his eyes look wild and scared, “Forget I did that. We can just pretend it didn’t happen.”

Whether it is the look on Thomas’ face; the frightened, wide-open expression, or if it’s the exhilaration from everything before that brings him to do it is neither here nor there when Newt thinks, _Just once more_, and leans in to kiss him again.

It is more successful the second time. Their lips meet, Newt tilts his head and Thomas does the same, hand coming up to cradle his jaw, and their faces fit together just right. This time, when Newt touches him he doesn’t flinch away, and when Thomas’ lips part a little wider, Newt breathes deeply through his nose, however softly, so not to spook, and deepens it.

He shouldn’t be doing this. He really, _really_ shouldn’t be doing this, but Thomas is so gorgeous, and Newt doesn’t know if he will even get another chance. Newt slides his hands down Thomas’ neck to his shoulders, careful to avoid his number, and feels Thomas thread his fingers through Newt’s wet hair. The drag of his nail’s against Newt’s scalp makes him groan involuntarily. Thomas freezes at the noise, and Newt’s heartbeat picks up, panicked, worried that he has ruined everything and not ready for this to be over so soon.

But Thomas just smiles against his lips, so soft Newt’s heart breaks a little.

He’s never kissed anyone before; certainly not like this and for so long. How many times has he seen Minho wrapped up with a random girl or boy they met at a market ring while Newt bought them food and supplies? (A stranger of whom, eventually, Newt would have to drag his friend away from because they were five miles from their safehouse and Newt was tired. Later, Minho would tell him all about it and Newt would pretend to care). What Minho failed to mention, however, is how stressful the whole thing can be. Is he doing this right? Thomas doesn’t seem to have any objections, but still. He might just be being polite.

What if he pushes too hard? What if he isn’t pushing hard enough? What if he does something Thomas doesn’t like? What if –

What if someone comes outside right now and sees them, and reality will come crashing back _hard,_ and Newt will have to live with himself afterward.

This is what makes him finally pull away. Thomas’ hands are still threaded in his hair when he blinks open his eyes, confused. He casts his face down, suddenly unable to look Thomas in the eyes anymore, and says, “I’m sorry.”

Thomas shakes his head. “What? Why?”

“Why?” Newt laughs, astonished and breathless, “You know why.”

“Uh,” Thomas frowns, “No, I don’t. I – You kissed me back? I don’t –”

Newt says, “Teresa,” and watches Thomas’ face just drop.

He casts his eyes to the water between them, voice lowering to a murmur, “Right. Teresa.”

“I –” Newt groans, loud and helpless, and presses the heels of his palms to his eyes until he sees gold sparks. “Fuck it. I like you, Tommy,” Newt says, “I do. And I’m sorry I kissed you because I shouldn’t have, but I’m even more sorry that I don’t regret it, but. I won’t come between you and Teresa. I can’t do that.”

“Wait,” Thomas stops him, “Wait, wait, hold up a second. Me and … Teresa?”

Newt stares at him, wondering if Thomas is stupid, or juts thinks Newt is. “Yes. You and Teresa. You’re – ”

“Oh my god,” Something visibly clicks in Thomas’ brain, then, eyes clearing and leaving Newt confused and three steps behind. “You think me and Teresa are …? No,” he laughs, “No, Teresa and I, we. We aren’t – it’s not like that, with her.”

“So,” Newt mutters, “You aren’t together?”

Thomas shakes his head no. Newt feels like an absolute idiot.

“Actually,” Thomas says, “For a while, I thought you were interested in her.”

Newt nearly chokes on his own saliva. “Me? No, no. I’m not.” He shakes his head and finds himself admitting, “The other week when you were playing the piano, and that storm was ripping up half the desert outside, I wanted to kiss you. But …”

“You thought I was in a relationship, yeah. Fuck.” Thomas swears, “See, I thought I just got my signals crossed with you. Wow. How ‘bout that.”

Newt kisses him again, exhilarated, arms around Thomas’ neck to pull him tighter against him.

“We’re so dumb,” Thomas whispers in between kisses. “We – oh, hey, Newt.” He pulls away sharply and closes his palm over the bandage on Newt’s shoulder, which has begun to unclip. After fastening it tight with a short, affirmative pat and a _There you go_, Thomas says, “We should probably get out now. It’s getting cold.”

It is. Newt sees goosebumps forming on their skin, the warm night air is shifting cooler, aggravating the water clinging to their bodies.

Newt pushes the clip on his bandage, making sure. “We should.”

“My room?” Thomas suggests, which instantly makes Newt grin.

“Oh?”

Thomas gives him a solid look. “I just mean … Come on.”

Grabbing their clothes and sneaking back into the house is relatively easy – most of their roommates have either relocated to the front or have retired upstairs to sleep. Regardless, Newt would much prefer not being seen shuffling upstairs uncomfortably in wet jeans and dripping hair, hand in hand with Thomas, and clutching their shirts to their chests. They reach Thomas’ bedroom door without any trouble. Thomas’ hand touches the handle and pushes it open, questionably, when Newt throws a thumb over his shoulder vaguely and says, “I’ll be right back.”

Thomas nods and disappears into his room. Ideally, Newt should have changed inside his bedroom, however, this clearly isn’t a night of active thinking. Dumping the ruined jeans and shirt in a nondescript corner of the room, Newt looks around for an adequate T-shirt and shorts, because it may be a little too soon to alert Thomas on to the fact that he generally sleeps naked. Newt takes his things and leaves and stops just short of running straight into Teresa in the hallway.

“Oh!” She cries, surprised, one hand on her heart and the other clutched around her toothbrush, “Sorry, I didn’t see – you.”

She looks at Newt and his state of undress, and his clothes under one arm, and most importantly the way his body is turned toward Thomas’ bedroom, lamp light feeding through the door, ajar. Newt, for the most part, works very hard to keep his face perfectly neutral.

It isn’t worth the effort, as Teresa glances between him and Thomas’ bedroom once and turns back, wide grin on her face. “_Oh_.”

Newt frowns at her tone and the look on her face, and he may as well add yet another revelation to the list, because, yes, Teresa does not look surprised in the slightest.

“You knew,” he says, acquisitional, dropping his arms by his side in defeat.

“I did,” Teresa agrees, grin widening, if possible. Newt can tell she is enjoying this very much. “And I was wondering why neither of you were doing anything about it, but then Minho told me how you thought …” She lets subtext fill in the rest of that sentence.

_Damn it, Minho. _

“But, hey,” Teresa continues, “I’m glad it all worked out.” And then she winks, of all fucking things, and Newt wants nothing but to sink into the floor.

“Don’t do that.”

Teresa asks, “Don’t do what?” and winks again, mischievously, and it is in that exact Newt is hit right in the chest with such affection for her, like a basketball to the chest, it almost knocks him over.

Shoving her toward the bathroom, Newt shakes his head and huffs, “Oh, go to bed, you asshole. Goodnight.”

Teresa laughs, quiet, and says, “You, too. Don’t have too much fun. Say hi to Tommy for me.” Then she disappears into the hallway bathroom, the soft click of the door jamb echoing alongside the soft ring of her laughter.

Newt’s hormones finally allow him some gracious leeway, and he has two senses to pull on his shorts before he enters Thomas’ room, at least. Thomas is sitting with his back against the headboard when Newt shuts the door behind him, looking up at the sound of the click. A book balances on top of his calves, which he stops writing in the second he catches sight of Newt. Thomas closes the book, pen marking the page, and something in the careful curve of his grin and the small crinkles in the corner of his eyes (laugh lines, Newt notices, off-hand, and he suddenly would like to touch all of him) tells Newt that he heard everything said out in the hall.

“Teresa says goodnight,” Newt mutters, mouth dry.

Thomas sets the book aside on the table next to him – _Paradise Lost_, Newt reads as he comes in closer – and says, “She’s sweet like that.” He yawns, and it turns into a cough.

Newt sits on the edge of the bed, despite Thomas’ encouragements to move further in. “She knew. From the start.”

Thomas’ hand pauses for only a heartbeat as he reaches for the glass of water beside him, “Yeah. That’s not surprising.”

Of course, it is when they are lying down, side by side, legs over the blanket and Thomas’ hand tracing the ridges of Newt’s thumb, and Newt’s toe gently pressing against Thomas’ ankle, that Newt realises he’s never been in this room before. The thought sharpens reality a little, and suddenly Newt is taking in his surroundings a little clearer; the short pile of books on the dresser, the clothing thrown over the fancy egg chair in the corner of the room, and the smell. It’s together something that is so inherently Thomas, but new at the same time; uncharted territory.

Exciting, waiting to be discovered.

Thomas’ eyes are lidded and drooping when he whispers, “Hi.”

“Hey,” Newt whispers back, “Tired?” Thomas nods, humming. “Me too. Wasn’t expecting the sudden load of exercise. You’re quite the competitive bastard, aren’t you?”

Thomas presses his face into the pillow, sheepishly, and groans, “Shut up. Look who’s talking.”

“True. I did win, though.”

Thomas snorts. “Technically it was a draw, but we both cheated so neither one is valid, really.”

Newt reaches forward and hooks his finger around the collar of Thomas’ shirt, “Whatever helps you sleep.”

Right on cue, Thomas yawns again. His eyes shut properly this time, and for a moment Newt allows himself to look, knuckles pressed against his collar bone and enjoying the feeling of warm skin beneath soft cotton. “Goodnight, Tommy,” he whispers. Thomas’ breathing has already evened out, breath disturbing the fine hairs on Newt’s forehead.

They sleep.

–

Newt lucid dreams.

It’s been this way since he was a child. Often it is just him, sitting in a room or standing on a street corner, watching the world go about its business around him. It is the sound of the gulls on Venice beach, loud and sharp as they fly overhead and fade into existence. Or it’s the constant, never-ending roar of people around him, talking and laughing and shouting at everything and no one. One time it was him in a room, sitting at a dining table with mother and father on one side of him and Minho on the other.

All their faces were turned away from him as they spoke quietly to each other or, in Minho’s case, to the empty seat beside him. He would wait for the longest time until his stomach couldn’t take it anymore, and he would reach toward the plate of food before them. As soon as his hands touched the metal (cold, shiny and silver, it almost hurt to touch) it was then that they would look to him. They had no faces.

That was then.

Now, it is Thomas standing on the edge of a pool that plunged so low the water turned black. It is Teresa standing by a large, never-ending lake, her black hair blowing wildly in the wind. It is Minho and Sonya and Brenda and Harriet tossing between them an object that changed vividly each time it would land in one of their open palms. It is the four girls, laid as they were in the centre of the room below the skylight, doused in harsh sunlight and dark shadow, their arms, and legs unfolding outward like a flower as the world spins toward them in a slow helix.

It is Thomas, sleeping under a blanket of sand, peacefully. Thomas coming back from a morning run, except he walks on the ceiling, and laughs when Newt jumps to reach. It’s the two of them kissing in the middle of an empty street when Thomas turns to dust beneath his fingers, blowing away in the wind. It is Thomas, Thomas, Thomas.

Today, it is his bedroom. Warm light filters in through the window in rivets. Newt lies on his side and watches the objects of the room sparkle like diamonds. Then, the sand begins to fill the room, allowed in through the windows. Grains hit Newt’s skin like a thousand tiny shards of glass and he lies, transfixed and frozen, as the sand begins to bury them.

Thomas calls his name and the world turns black for a heartbeat of a second. Then, Newt blinks his eyes open and he is exactly where he had been without all of the sand swallowing them whole, and Thomas, staring down at him with a deep crease between his eyebrows.

“Hey,” Thomas says, quietly, “You’re awake now, it’s okay.”

Newt rubs sleep out of his eyes, stretching. “Wha’ happened?”

“You were having a nightmare.” Thomas brushes hair out of Newt’s eyes, “You went all stiff and you were breathing really fast. I wasn’t sure if I should wake you, or …”

Imaginary sand lines the tops of Thomas’ shoulders. Newt looks away for a moment to check the rest of the room, and when he turns back it is gone.

“You don’t remember?”

“Not at all,” Newt lies and pushes himself up to sit. Thomas appears unconvinced. Newt kisses him once on the lips to wipe the frown off his face. It mostly works.

“Good morning,” Newt says.

Thomas sighs, dropping his head on to Newt’s shoulder. “Morning,” he replies, “You scared me.”

Newt says, “Good thing I have you to wake me, then,” and they dress and head downstairs to begin the day. They make it as far as cereal poured into two bowls before Thomas has Newt pressed against the counter bench, and properly kisses him good morning. And, well, Newt tries to care that they have housemates, and this is a shared kitchen and whatnot, but it is generally very hard on the best of days, never mind breakfast time when his brain isn’t quite up to the task of cognitive thought just yet, and Thomas is so very warm. 

Therefore, when Gally groans into his breakfast, loud and objecting, as Thomas’ fingers hook through the belt loops on his jeans, it is a tough feat to pull himself together, but he manages. Sort of.

“Seriously?” Gally groans, dropping his spoon so that it clinks purposefully into the bowl, “Guys, can we please not? Some of us are trying to eat.”

“We were here first, Gal,” Thomas points out, lips barely parting from Newt’s.

“Yeah, but I’m here _now_.”

Newt tilts his head just a little to the side, just far enough to speak, “It’s a nice day today. Eat on the porch.”

He feels rather than sees the glare Gally sends his way, “Do you have to do this every morning?” Gally complains, “You – Teresa! Could you _please_ put a leash on your friend and his boy toy?”

Teresa pretends not to hear and continues her forward march toward the coffee machine. The heady whirring and nondescript grunt from her which follows is an answer enough. Newt and Thomas snort. Gally cordially flips them off.

“Aww,” Brenda coos, shuffling into the room with engine grease on her cheek, hip bumping Thomas and dislodging him from Newt on her way past, “Young love.”

After a few minutes of insistent nudging and guilt-tripping in the form of, _What would Fry say about this? _Newt and Thomas give up their spot against the counter and move to the table with their finally made bowls of cereal, as the rest of the house begins to shuffle into the kitchen at their own pace. Later Newt and Thomas decide to take a trip down to the springs, Minho and Teresa tagging along – Minho because he was bored, and Teresa because Minho forced her, so he didn’t quote-un-quote _feel like a third wheel_.

While Teresa and Minho skip stones in the too hot water Newt lies in the back of the Jeep with Thomas by his side, quiet, closing their eyes beneath the shade of the tarp. Comforted by the sound of Thomas’ steady breathing beside him (full and even, today, barley any rasp) and the warm wind kissing his skin, Newt takes a deep breath and falls asleep, relaxed.

“What do you think it’ll be like?” Thomas asks, “Up there?”

Newt pulls his gaze from where their hands press together in the air, palm to palm, feeling the soft thrum of each other’s heartbeat through the pads of their fingers. Outside the Golden Hour is in it’s prime. Their hands cast shadows onto Newt’s bedsheets.

A shadow cuts its way across Thomas’ face, and Newt wishes to wipe it away. “On Callisto?” Newt shrugs, “Dunno. The same. Completely different. _Neo Utopia_,” he whispers the term WCKD seem the proudest of, flaunting it at every corner during their entire stay at the Program.

“I don’t know,” Newt continues, “All I picture in my mind when I think about it are those posters that are plastered all over the country.”

The posters in question: sandy beaches full of men and women sunbathing with space helmets. A group of people walking their dogs, floating a foot above the ground. Colourful kitchens and houses and yards and swimming pools full of purple and blue water. And the ice; miles and miles of ice lit up in a spectrum of colours; bright and beautiful and cosmically endless.

“Why?” Newt asks.

Thomas only shrugs, and says, “I’ve been thinking about it a lot.” He laces their fingers together and brings his hand to his lips, and sighs. “Do you think … Do you think they’ll _feel_ like us? Human?”

Newt considers this for a minute, and says, “I think so. Don’t see how they wouldn’t. It’s all of our tissue and flesh samples they took, so.”

Idly, Newt’s free hand drifts to his thigh where they grafted his skin, now almost flawlessly replaced with a synthetic replica. A fine, silver outline of a rectangle is the only evidence left behind.

“Yeah, but,” Thomas breathes deeply through his nose, frustrated, “Do you find it a little … creepy?” he asks, “How hundreds of years from now, on some big floating rock in space that circles around an even bigger floating rock, there will exist someone who looks just like you? Who talks just like you? Who’ll have kids, and grandkids, and great grandkids that will have your genetic makeup, but won’t be yours?”

Newt says, “Jupiter is a gas planet, Tommy.”

Thomas does not look like a single atom in him gives a fuck.

Newt rolls on to his back. The desert wind disturbs the curtains, creating a film out of shadows and projecting it across the far wall, “I mean, well. That’s how it is, isn’t it? This is what we signed up for. Plus, it’s already done, so no use stressing out about it now.”

Thomas picks at a thread in the sheets, murmuring, “I’m not stressing.”

“Little bit.” Newt pinches his fingers together and squints. Thomas catches them in his fist and squeezes tight.

“Anyway,” Thomas continues, “You’re right, it doesn’t matter.”

“Well,” Newt turns back on his side, sliding his hand under Thomas’ pillow, “I didn’t say that. And it sounded like it mattered a few seconds ago.”

Thomas says, “It’s all just sinking in, I guess.”

“It’s been five months, Tommy,” Newt says, frowning.

“Yes, but I was unconscious for one and a half of them,” Thomas says, which. Yeah, okay, fine. Newt lifts his hand to rest familiarly against Thomas’ shoulder, where he feels the raised surface of Thomas’ number beneath his palm. The number _5_ kisses the edge of his pointer finger, and the remaining _2 7 8 9 4_ travel down the heart line. He closes his eyes.

It’s almost funny how comforting they feel to him now. Newt no longer flinches away and averts his eyes whenever he sees him without a shirt. This is, mainly, Thomas’ influence.

There was a night less than two weeks ago, after everyone had gotten back from a spontaneous day out to the amusement park sitting tremulously on the outskirts of the desert. Dizzy and high off sugar and horrible carnival food, skin flushed pink from the sun, Newt and Thomas hid behind the locked bedroom door and took turns slowly peeling each other’s clothes off. He thinks of Thomas leaning against a chain-link fence, wiping cotton candy off his face and laughing over something Sonya said, wind tussling his hair without mercy, and how he felt with his face pressed into the warm skin of Newt’s neck, breathing deeply. Newt counted each vertebra with the pads of his fingers, and remembered how it felt to want him so badly it _ached_.

Thomas’ eyelashes tickled his skin while his hands tugged at the buttons of Newt’s shirt, slowly freeing each one. His lips moved but Newt barely heard the words that came out over the roaring in his ears, and the pounding of his heart against his ribcage, so hard he was sure Thomas could hear it. Newt kept his eyes closed until every item of clothing pooled around their feet, shoes and socks kicked over to one corner of the bed, like a pile of rubble.

“Newt,” Thomas whispered, palms flat and sure on Newt’s back who, still, kept his eyes tightly shut. He pressed his forehead to Newt’s and said, “It’s okay. It’s just you and me. You can open your eyes.”

Slowly, Thomas’ gentle whispers and warm hands to guide him through, Newt scrambled together enough courage to blink his eyes open. For a moment the room was a blurry mess of shapes and dim light before everything sharpened into glorious technicolour; Thomas an inch away from him, so close they felt their breath on each other’s cheeks, the flush on Thomas’ skin deep with nervousness and excitement and incomparable unfamiliarity. His eyes, washed dark in the low light, shone bright and happy before, finally, the dark blur against his shoulder that Newt had been blocking out on instinct, sharpened.

Newt allowed himself a good minute to stare and wait for the gut-wrenching panic to creep in (it never came. Strangely, Thomas’ numbers stared at Newt as he blinked back slowly, apathetically calm) before Thomas said, “Is this okay?” – his fingertips skirting the edge of the bandage wrapped tight around Newt’s bicep cautiously. 

Again, he waited, but there were no cold, skeletal fingers tickling down his spine, nor any spiders crawling beneath his skin, and no rope taking hold of his heart and _squeezing_ until he could no longer breathe. He nodded, and Thomas unwrapped the gauze from his arm, purposeful and cautious, allowing Newt the chance to pull back at any moment.

He didn’t do that, not at all, but instead spent the remainder of the night committing the rest of Thomas’ body to memory. 

Now, Newt gently runs the pad of his finger over the rough bumps. He has briefly wondered whether anyone else in the world knows them. His mother would have, obviously, but does Teresa? What about the community they had lived at before? Might they have had some sort of internal registry among them? It isn’t uncommon according to Jeff, who, after finding community after community, stated that each of them required him to hand over his numbers to their leaders as admission fee.

(The thought obviously alarmed him, and he ran. Neither Thomas nor Teresa had any comments.)

Thomas’ eyelashes flutter shut against the pillow, as he sighs quietly through his nose. Newt’s finger settles on the _7_ and presses down, just enough for the skin to dimple. Groaning, Thomas lifts his palm to place it over Newt’s shoulder, covering the six digits from view.

“We should get up,” he murmurs, face half pressed into the cotton.

Newt laughs, softly, “Probably. Eventually.”

“What time is it?”

Newt pretends to check, and answers, “Midday.” Thomas groans again, and Newt says, “We _could_ get up. Or.”

“Or?”

Instead of answering, Newt pushes at Thomas’ shoulder until he is lying on his back, and settles on top of him, knees bracketing Thomas’ hips and hands pressed into the pillow on either side of his head. His finger loops around a loose curl in his hair, twisting the silky texture together. Thomas laughs, shaking his head.

“_Right_. Or.”

Newt kisses his neck to hide his smile. Thomas groans again.

A week following one of the worst dust storms that have hit Los Vegas in the last six months, Newt wakes to a cold spot on the mattress beside him, and the sound of someone being violently ill.

The combination of the horrible retching, the hushed whispers and the empty bed beside him instantly sends Newt into a panic. Ripping the covers off his body, Newt launches himself out of bed and into the hall without a second thought, ignoring the sting at the back of his eyes from the sudden burst of light. In the hall he finds Minho, Sonya, Harriet, and Brenda standing against the wall of by the door to the first bathroom, their faces pinched and concerned. A little way down he also sees the other boys poking their heads out of their respective bedrooms, eyes wide with alarm and confusion.

Minho spots Newt instantly as he enters the space, moving to his side immediately. “Hey, you’re awake,” he says, quietly.

Newt shakes his head, still trying to shake the remaining hold that sleep has on his brain, and, says, “What is going on?”

“Thomas,” Minho answers, “He’s, uh. He’s really sick. Teresa’s in there with him, I don’t know what’s – whoa, easy!”

Newt ignores his friend’s cry of concern and pushes past him to get to the bathroom door, hesitating only a moment before knocking gently and announcing, “It’s Newt.”

Barely a second later the door opens to reveal Teresa, hair mussed from bed and blue eyes wide and frightened. Everything about her expression makes Newt’s blood run ice cold. Inside, someone – _Thomas_ – is groaning, low and pained.

“Hi,” she whispers and takes Newt’s hand. Her fingers are almost frozen as if all the blood has not only drained from her face but from the rest of her body, too, “Come in.”

Newt understands why. The moment to door shuts behind him, he sees Thomas at the end of the bathroom, curled against the tile with his head in his arms, leaning against the toilet as if it is the only thing that is keeping him upright.

Newt swears. Teresa rushes back to Thomas, leaning down to tell him that Newt is here. Thomas mumbles something akin to _It’s gross_ and _Don’t want you to see me like this_, which Newt finds absolutely ridiculous and apparently so does Teresa. She shakes her head and beckons Newt closer, who is already halfway over. The open window breathes warm night air into the room, and Newt can’t tell if it’s making things better or worse.

“Tommy?” Newt murmurs softly, touching his back, and kneeling down. Thomas only groans again, and aggressively shuts the toilet lid. When he obviously has no intentions of elaborating, Newt looks up at Teresa for answers.

“The dust,” she says, “It was … bad this time. He went out too soon, after.”

“Shit,” Newt hisses, closing his eyes. He remembers the afternoon following the dust storm; the murky grey sky and stick air. Newt and Minho donned masks to travel down to the store for some food since no one felt like cooking, not even Fry. Thomas insisted on coming with them.

“He likes to push himself, because he’s an idiot,” Teresa says, lips curled in long-suffering irritation.

From the bowl, Thomas moans, “I’m right here.”

“Good. You need to hear the truth once in a while.” She pinches the bridge of her nose and sighs.

Newt gently taps her on the knee. “Hey, I’ve got this.”

Teresa eyes him, eye red-rimmed and tired, “You sure?” Newt nods. “Okay. I’ll, um. I’ll be outside. Call if you need anything.”

“Are you okay?” Newt asks, once they’re alone. Thomas manages a nod. After closing the toilet lid, Newt slips both arms under Thomas’ armpits and carefully lifts him to sit on top of it, pressing his back into the cool tile. Finally, for the first time since entering the bathroom, he is able to see Thomas’ face; pale and grey, his eyes red-rimmed and pained.

Newt feels red anger tickle at the edges of his vision. There was a time where he would wake up to the brief bark of a car horn, blocks away.

Thomas wipes his face, “I’m sorry, I didn’t want to wake you up. Didn’t want to wake anyone up, I just …”

“Felt sick,” Newt finishes for him. Thomas nods once, defeated. He shuffles into a position on the tiles that won’t completely destroy his knees, knelt before Thomas and leaning backward to give him enough air, “Tommy, it’s alright. I just want to make sure you’re okay. We all do. Here, drink some water.”

A minute later Thomas is gratefully gulping down cold water from the toothbrush cup sat next to the bathroom sink. “I’m alright now,” he says, looking everything but _alight_, “Pretty sure I got it all out.”

Newt frowns, the tone of that sentence not sitting right with him. He asks, “Got what all out?”

“The –” Thomas does a fluid wave, which Newt supposes is meant to mean something, “The. The mucus. And. And a little blood.”

“_Blood?_” Newt says, his voice echoing sharply around the room and making them both flinch, “Blood? Tommy, what –?”

“Look, it’s fine.”

“_Fine?_”

“I –” Thomas takes a deep breath, finding Newt’s hands pressed firmly to his knees, holding them, fingers like ice, “Listen, I’m careful usually. I swear. I haven’t had a reaction like this in years. I just wasn’t expecting that storm.”

Something in the set of Thomas’ shoulders, and the way his eyes skit about the room, never landing on one thing for longer than a heartbeat and absolutely refusing to lock with Newt’s, leaves him Newt with a troubling feeling in his stomach. With a nauseating tingle in the back of his throat, and fighting off the approaching panic, hearing Minho’s words in his head – _Thomas is sick_ – and telling himself that the world isn’t about to end, Newt swallows, mouth dry, and asks, “Careful about what?”

Thomas gaze grows distant. A deep seated, internal struggle is either won or defeated before Thomas shakes his head, runs his fingers through his hair, and says, “I have to tell you something. But you need to promise me not to tell the others.”

“What is it?”

Thomas takes a deep breath. “Okay. My asthma, it, um. It wasn’t caused by the dust. It’s an old disease, from before the dust even existed. My grandfather had it, apparently. Runs in the family,” Thomas adds, with a bitter laugh.

Newt frowns. His ears are ringing. “What are you talking about? You were _born_ with this?”

Thomas nods. Newt wants to pass out.

“But I –” Newt stutters, his brain desperately trying to catch up, “But you can’t have been. You’re a Donor, Tommy, WCKD accepted you into the Program. They would have picked up on that when they tested all of our blood, I don’t …”

Thomas’ expression suddenly, unmistakably, turns guilty.

“Thomas, what did you do?”

“I took file off the guy in the cot next to mine and switched our names around in the middle of the night,” Thomas admits.

Newt nearly does pass out, right then and there.

He hisses, “You did _what?_ You switched the file, Tommy, what –”

“I had to!” Thomas hisses back, voice desperate, “I had to, Newt, you don’t get it. I had to be picked for this project, because –” Thomas cuts himself off, and doesn’t elaborate.

“Because what?” Newt prompts, trying in vain to keep the anger out of his voice.

After a few maddening heartbeats, “Because I know Teresa never would have gone through with the Program if we weren’t both picked.” Thomas says, “And I wasn’t about to let her fuck herself over for me.”

Newt closes his eyes. Ankles giving out, he falls on to the cold tile with a thud. Thomas threads his hands through his hair, gripping hard enough to tear.

“I don’t understand. Why?”

“Why?” Thomas’ face snaps up. His eyes are cold and furious, hair wild, “_Why?_ Because they want people who are healthy, Newt. People who aren’t going to cause issues further down the line when they’re trying to build paradise. They needed people that were just a little malnourished and a little sick, but, hey, genetics say they could’ve won the fucking Olympics in a better life. They didn’t want a sick, seventeen-year-old with a genetic disease that’ll wipe him out before age 30, because what’s the fucking point of even bothering with that?”

“Okay, okay,” Newt reaches up and grasps Thomas’ wrists, bringing them close to his chest when Thomas’ voice begins to waver toward the end of his short rant, eyes growing pink, “It’s okay, Tommy. I’m sorry. _Shhh_.”

Thomas’ head falls on to Newt’s shoulder, body convulsing with deep, restrained sobs as he slowly falls to pieces into Newt’s arms, who can do nothing but collect the pieces.

In the early hours of the morning as they lie together in the middle of the bed, Thomas’ temple to Newt’s elbow and Newt’s other arm wrapped loose and protective around Thomas’ waist, keeping him close where he can feel the breath on his cheeks and the gentle rise and fall of his chest, Newt’s mind runs thousand miles. _We would have had to go back to the community_, Thomas had confessed to Newt, still in the bathroom. _Why would you have? _Newt asked because, from the very small amount of information he has been able to gather about Thomas and Teresa’s desert community, he deduces it hadn’t exactly been the happiest place on earth.

Thomas nodded, and simply said, _There’s nothing else._

_Not anymore, _Newt thinks, now, leaning over to press his forehead against Thomas’.

“Hey.” Thomas’ eyes flutter open at the sound of Newt’s voice. Newt curls the hem of Thomas’ shirt around his finger and says, “Did you really swap yours and that poor bastard’s charts around?”

And Newt has to hand it to him; he doesn’t even flinch.

“Yeah.”

“Without anyone noticing? Or checking? You just _changed the names?_”

“Yeah.”

“Bloody hell,” Newt laughs breathlessly and shakes his head in astonishment. His mind travels back in time, months ago, to Ava Paige speaking about those who hadn’t made it through the Donation process. Who were too weak, or too sick, or their bodies just couldn’t handle it. But Thomas, somehow, made it through, even when all of the odds were against him.

Leaning forward, brushing his lips against Thomas’, simply allowing them to linger together in the comfortable quiet for a moment, he whispers, “You marvellous creature.”

“What about this?” Newt turns to where Thomas loiters by the tissue boxes (no doubt scanning the shelves and calculating which brand he can purchase the most of for the cheapest) and waves an inhaler in the air, innocently enough. Thomas apparently does not share the sentiment, as his face immediately drops into a disappointed scowl.

“You promised you weren’t going to do this,” he tells Newt, voice low.

Newt slowly drops the inhaler but does not move to put it back on the shelf. “Not doing anything,” he smiles, “I’m just saying, maybe –”

Thomas shakes his head and abandons the tissues. “_No_, Newt,” he says, strolling past and pulling off an absolute circus trick by snatching the inhaler from Newt’s hand and tossing it back on the shelf, and lastly stealing the cart, “I’ve survived long enough without one.”

“Alright, but what if –” _It gets worse? _Newt means to say, but cuts himself off before the remainder of the sentence could tumble out past his lips.

As luck would have it, Thomas hears the rest anyway. Parking the cart between isle six and seven, minorly inconvenient to whoever wished to access it, he then turns toward Newt.

“Don’t worry about me, okay?” Thomas says, gently holding Newt’s wrists in his hands, “I’m fine. I’m going to be fine, and –” a quick kiss, just a small one, on the corner of Newt’s mouth, one that he has to lift onto his toes for, and tickles when Thomas pulls back “– _we_ are going to be fine.”

The morning after the incident, when Thomas and Newt, accompanying him, came down stairs in the morning, they found everyone in the kitchen, quiet as a mouse. Or, rather, became so the moment they stepped foot through the threshold. It was the kind of silence that felt jittery and thick; a trojan horse of questions settled themselves on the tips of everyone’s tongues, and furiously pounded against their teeth for release. It looked nearly painful to hold them back. Thomas – and credit must be given where credit is due, as everyone held back exceptionally – made it through half of his cereal and morning toast before, not looking up, said, “Come out with it before you fall over and die, or I’m going to kill you all myself.” 

Questions were mostly answered in a simple yes or no, and heavily moderated by the sheer force of both Newt and Teresa’s glares, and Minho’s quiet support.

Then, last night, it happened again, except on a much smaller scale they drew far less attention. Thomas opted to use the bathroom adjoined to the bedroom, this time, and Newt managed to awake just as he was wrapping up. _Ate too much at dinner_, was the excuse he gave Newt’s weary, concerned face at three o’clock in the morning. Newt said nothing and simply helped him over to the sink to rinse his mouth out, not missing how he shivered in his thin bed shirt and bare feet. And, well, maybe it was true; it can sometimes happen, Newt concluded, mind flipping back to how he has spent the entire day after the experience at the local library, reading through every old medical book he could find on a near-religious level. 

There had been no blood that time, at least.

Finally, with a sigh far more exaggerated than it needed to be, just for emphasis, Newt gives in.

“Okay, fine.”

“Promise?” Thomas says, raising his pinkie in the air, almost like a challenge.

Newt laughs, and links their fingers together, “Promise, Tommy.”

On the way to the register Thomas stops in his tracks and makes a bee-line for the chocolate display. Newt manages to be patient for an entire minute, before his resolve crumbles and he moves to peer over Thomas’ shoulder. He finds him with a nut bar in one hand and milk chocolate swirl in the other, torn.

Thomas notices him judging and says, “It’s for Teresa.”

“Sure it is, sweetheart.”

Thomas tosses both in the cart, just to be spiteful.

They go through Zoey and her frizzy blue hair on their way out (because they always do, because Newt hates watching her eyes go wide when she sees Thomas, but enjoys them narrow when she sees Newt – more specifically Thomas _with_ Newt – and makes absolutely sure to place the 600mL bottle of lube on the belt first, because he is petty by nature and isn’t about to change anytime soon). Then, after making sure to slip his hand into Thomas’ back pocket, they leave.

“What?” Newt asks, innocently, blinking up at Thomas like an angel as they stuff their backpacks outside. Thomas shakes his head and bites back a grin, and Newt kisses him for three seconds longer than what could be considered _publicly decent_ before they walk home, hand in hand, identical to how they travelled here.

As it turns out, not all of their neighbours are absolutely terrified and wary of the ‘street dogs’ up on Paradise Hill; an older man and his wife, usually seen mowing their lawn or watering the immaculately kept garden out the front of their yard, engage in conversation every now and then. (Their favourite happens to be Sonya – no surprises – and the girl waltzes through the front door with small cakes and other deserts two times a week at minimum.)

Today it is only Mrs. Mills out and about, seated on the porch swing, tablet in hand and reading glasses pinched low on her thin nose. Thomas calls out as they pass, and she looks up, squeaks and deposits her tablet on the plush cushion beside her to scurry up to them, slippers hissing against the gravel path. Newt wonders what it is they did when they were younger to live at such a place with it’s gated entrance and million-dollar houses. Business entrepreneurs, Newt likes to imagine, or perhaps global sales, or maybe even WCKD retirees.

“Hello, boys!” Mrs. Mills calls as she reaches the fence, dress billowing around her ankles, the sun casting hundreds of small marks across her cheeks through her large hat, “And how might we be today?”

“Fine, thank you, ma’am,” Thomas answers, because he always answers, because, unlike Newt, he actually knows how to speak to adults. Newt only stands and stares awkwardly, looking around at everything until the other person decides to leave.

The old woman beams. Thomas is her favourite.

“You’ve been into town, I see,” she says, and she and Thomas launch into a polite conversation that Newt doesn’t much care for.

He carefully zones out, nodding and humming at the correct time so not to draw any questions toward himself, eyes fixed upon the fountain in the middle of the round-about up ahead, where three roads meet. He always found it interesting, from the moment they all arrived that first day; driving past it in the shuttle, he had seen it, and the installation remained stuck in his head for the rest of the day. A giant scorpion, it’s tail curled high above its body menacingly, water spouting from the sharp, lethal stinger.

Why is it there? Who decided that was a good idea or even a slightly okay idea? Newt wonders how everyone else sees the sculpture, people who have lived in this exact community their entire lives, right here or otherwise.

He has so many questions, and no one to answer them.

Unless.

“Mrs. Mills?” Newt asks, cutting into the conversation and stopping the old woman halfway through her telling them that she _Couldn’t help but notice _and that they _Made the most beautiful of couples_, and their _Children would be striking, if it worked that way_, and so on, while Thomas smiled and nodded. “You know that fountain?” he points to it, “I was just wondering, how long has it been there?”

“Oh! That?” She says, “I have no idea, I’m afraid. It was here before Peter and I moved in. But, I’m sure if you take a look at it there should be a sort of plaque, somewhere. Maybe at the back.”

Thomas raises a curious eyebrow in his direction. Newt ignores him, and thanks Mrs. Mills.

“Oh, it’s nothing at all! Anyway,” she flaps her hands toward them in a shooing gesture, “I won’t hold you boys any longer, not with all those guests you have up there.”

Thomas’ fingers tighten around Newt’s hand. “What do you mean?” he asks, but the old lady is already walking back up the gravel path surrounded by her pristine plants and cacti, yelling _Bye now!_ as she goes.

Newt tugs on Thomas’ arm to coax him down the sidewalk, towards the fountain. Thomas complies well enough, albeit frowning all the way, inquiring as to why Newt _cares about that big, ugly thing, anyway_. With the wind known to be unpredictable up here, Newt comes as close as he dares to the edge when reaching the fountain, to avoid coming out drenched at the end of it as much as possible. He scampers around the fountain, doing his best impression of a one-eyed deer – hunched, hair in his face, left eye stinging from a few drops of water which did manage to get him, searching for the plaque.

“Where is it?” he mutters to himself, at the same time that Thomas asks the air, “What did she mean?”

“Maybe there isn’t anything here …”

Thomas frowns, “Huh?”

“What?”

“Mrs. Mills. She said we had visitors,” Thomas says.

The water isn’t hitting as far back here, and Newt braces one foot against the lip of the fountain, peering inside. “I’m sure the others just got back earlier. That’s probably who she saw,” he says.

Thomas clicks his tongue, adjusting one of the shoulder straps, and staring up the road toward their home, “Who else could be up there?”

“No one, Tommy, it’s fine.”

Thomas turns to look at him, “Why are you so obsessed with this thing? It’s a fountain.”

“It doesn’t –” Newt stops, starts again, “It doesn’t look like it fits in, that’s all.”

“Fits in to what?” Thomas asks. When Newt fails to answer, he continues on as if he received one anyway, “Yeah, okay. But, like Mrs. Mills said, it’s old. It could be some heritage thing, or something, I don’t fucking know. They might’ve had to build the community around it.”

“Alright, but,” Newt brushes some dust off the lip, “It just looks like …” _It crawled out from a dream world and made a home for itself here. _

Newt says, “You know how in dreams, Tommy, you could be doing the most mundane thing in the whole bloody world, like walking down the street or sitting in a café, and everything looks fine at first glance. But the curtains are on fire, and it’s only raining on one side of the street.”

“Okay,” Thomas says slowly, coming up behind him, “So, that’s what this thing looks like to you?”

“In a way. Ah, found it!”

On a small, stone plated plaque, sitting almost clandestinely on the side of the fountain, lower than anyone would care to look, are the words _Property of WCKD_. Newt crouches down to take a closer look, Thomas peering over his shoulder. It is an old plaque, and the words have begun to erode away possibly years before. There is no date.

Thomas scoffs, “That’s surprising. Happy now?”

Newt clicks his tongue, and stands. He supposes it’s better than nothing. “Here,” he picks up two small rocks from the rim of the fountain, and hands one to Thomas, “Make a wish.”

Out loud, Thomas wishes they would go home. When Newt slaps his arm he laughs, and closes his eyes to wish for something proper. Once he is done, he takes a deep, grounding breath and underarms the pebble into the fountain. It bounces off one of the scorpion’s bulbous, slitted eyes, gratifyingly, before landing into the water with a small _plunk!_

Newt hums appreciatively, “Good shot. What did you wish for?”

Thomas says, “I’ll tell you when it comes true.” He then taps two fingers against Newt’s wrist, and grins. “Your turn.”

The shine from the sun reflecting off the water hurts his eyes. Newt shuts them, takes a moment to breathe, and listens to their surroundings; the slam of a car door, the distant beeps from the main thoroughfare down the hill, the screech of a front gate before the brash _slam_ as the lock clicks into place. His own hair tickles his nose.

Newt takes a deep breath and makes a wish. The pebble lands in the centre of the fountain and settles next to one of the creatures sharp, spindly legs. 

“Done?” Thomas asks, “What’d you wish for?”

Newt gives him a quick shove, turning him in the direction of the house, “None of your bloody business.”

There are a number of people surrounding the house when Newt and Thomas approach, all in black, and none that they recognise. At first, Newt’s newly uncharacteristically hopeful brain tries to convince him it is simply the others, back early from their trip, and so far away that the naked eye morphs their bodies into strange shapes and blurs. This, of course, is not the case, but it is something to mention about just how conditioned Newt’s brain has become to their new lifestyle that he entertains the impossible train of thought for longer than a second – because, once they turn the corner, past the bend of trees that curl outward into the street, everything sharpens into focus.

Accompanying the men in black are white vans, three of them, all branded with the large, silver letters which forcefully say _WCKD_. 

Thomas stops in his tracks, fingers tightening around Newt’s hand, fingernails digging into the skin below his knuckles. “Wicked,” he says, breath catching in his throat.

Without hesitating, Newt pulls them back behind the trees. “What are they doing here?”

Thomas shakes his head, whispering, “I don’t know. Check up?”

“With that many people?”

“Could they be …”

Newt doesn’t need Thomas to finish that sentence to know exactly what it is that is swimming through his brain. _Could they be here for me? Could they have figured it out? _Could they have realised he somehow switched the files, all those months ago? Have they been reviewing data, and realised they have made a huge mistake with Thomas? Are they here to rectify that?

All those thoughts had been the first to fly through Newt’s brain, too. But …

“No,” Newt shakes his head, “No, if it was for that they wouldn’t just be standing outside. What are they even doing?” He squints at the scene ahead, trying to make head or tails of anything that is happening.

“It looks like they’re waiting,” Thomas says, shuffling closer to Newt. “They’re just standing there. They know no one is home, and they’re just … waiting.”

Newt is half tempted to wait it out, to stay behind this tree and watch how long it takes them to do anything else, or leave, or possibly force their way in. However, thought of the others coming back and unknowingly driving straight into WCKD’s arms leaves an awful taste in his mouth. 

Newt says, “They have all our numbers, now. If Wicked wants to find someone they can. No, this is something else.”

“Do you think they’ll leave on their own?”

Newt shakes his head. “Doubt it. Looks like they’re setting up shop to wait it out. Tommy,” he says, “I think we should go over there.”

Thomas’ reaction is about as positive as Newt had expected.

“What?” Thomas hisses.

“I know, but we can’t just let them stay there. What if the others come home before us? They won’t know what’s happening. What if we need to warn them?”

“You.” Thomas stops, looking between Newt and the armada of WCKD men parked outside their house as if he isn’t entirely sure who to focus on, “You think this is something bad, don’t you?”

Newt doesn’t need to answer. By the tone of Thomas’ voice, and the look on his face, he is on the exact same train of thought.

“Okay,” Thomas says, taking one last deep breath and squeezing Newt’s hand. Together walk out from behind the bush and make their way over to the house. Somehow, they manage to avoid detection until only a few paces away.

The group appears to be divided into two; some survey the house, walking back and forth in the front garden, one on the porch and the rest down below, while the second half stand menacingly by the vans, on guard.

_Grievers_, Newt thinks, cold shiver running down his spine.

Stepping forward, Newt drops Thomas’ hand and says, loudly, “Can we help you?”

Only one of the men turn toward the sound of his voice, the only one without a mask. Beside him, Newt feels Thomas grow ridged.

“Ah, hello there, boys,” Dr. Janson smiles brightly at the two of them before, briefly, glancing down at the small tablet in his hand, most likely reminding himself of their names. “If you don’t remember, my name is –”

“We remember,” Thomas says.

“David,” Newt adds, remembering the man’s insistence back in the facility. Now, his lips twitch at the informality. “To what do we owe this visit, doctor?”

Janson looks briefly put out. He says, “Actually, it’s director, now.”

“Congratulations on the promotion. Is there something you,” he glances warily at the guards, “need?”

Janson’s smile is unrelenting. “Might we go inside and talk?” he asks, which makes Newt frown.

“We can’t talk out here?”

Thomas talks over him, and says, “Of course,” to Janson, giving Newt a hard look after he shoots him one first. A minute later Newt finds himself seated on the wide leather couch in the front room, Thomas at his side. Janson faces them from the other couch over the large coffee table, which is about as close as Newt is willing to have him, every sense on high alert.

_“_So,” Janson begins, hands on his knees, eyes scoping the vast room impressively, “How’ve you boys been, then?” Neither of them answers. Janson continues, after a beat, “Where are the rest of you, then?”

“Out. Can you tell us why you’re all here?” The words stumble out of Thomas’ mouth less than gracefully. He realises it, too, if the clipped, “I’m sorry,” added on is anything to go by, “It’s just that we weren’t expecting a visit any time soon. 

Janson takes a moment to eye the two of them scrutinisingly for a moment, enough so that Newt begins to feel jittery and wrong in his own skin. Finally, he smiles, and says, “Of course, and that is all completely understandable. Boys,” Janson says, now leaning forward over his knees. Newt and Thomas leave back in unison. “I’m sure you are aware of the most recent dust storm that hit the county a little over a month ago?”

Slowly, Newt nods, and Thomas does the same. It was a few weeks ago. The biggest of the year; quite nearly tore up the desert and the valley below. No one had power for an entire twenty-four hours afterwards. 

“Did quite a bit of damage, that one,” Janson says, in that soft tone of voice which always set Newt on edge. “As I am sure you’ve seen on the news. It wiped out half the grid between here and Phoenix. Hit some of Los Angeles, too. Many small towns are still picking up the pieces, and we’re fighting to restore power in most of them.” 

_Just get to the point_, Newt wants to say, the recap of current events is making him more uneasy by the second.

“The whole disaster took quite a hit to our resources, as I’m sure you can imagine,” Janson says, pausing for a moment before saying what he has really come here to tell them. “Listen, I’d prefer to talk to you all as a group –”

“Just say it,” Thomas says. 

Janson turns his attention to him. “Thomas?”

Thomas is looking at the ground. Newt feels his breath catch in his throat. Thomas says, “You don’t need to wait for the others. You can just say it now, to us, and get it over with.”

Janson takes a deep breath and scoots forward on the couch as if he is the one who needs to brace himself. Newt feels his fingertips go numb, as Janson says, “Look, boys, there really isn’t an easy way to say this, and I wish it didn’t have to be like this, I do, but with everything that has happened, I’m afraid that there isn’t enough resources available to us to be able protect the county and to keep you all living here at the same time.” 

He’d expected it, seen it coming a mile away, ever since Newt had caught the first glimpse of them all hovering around the house like bees. 

It still hits him like a bullet to the chest.

Newt’s ears go numb, and he listens to Janson explaining to them just how much resources this house uses, all of the electricity and water and everything it uses and takes from the city, from WCKD, like he is hearing it from underwater. 

Janson is still talking when he comes to, again, though he has far long stopped listening. Thomas, staring at the far wall in stilled shock, looks like he has, too.

“Is it just us?” Newt asks, lips stiff, voice not sounding his own.

Janson stops, mid-speech, and looks confused, “What is?”

Newt says, “Is it just us? That you’re throwing out?”

Janson shuffles in his seat. Newt feels a sick sense of pride for making this man even moderately uncomfortable. “I wouldn’t use that term –”

“Answer his question,” Thomas says, breaking out of his stupor to stare, cold and hard at Janson.

Janson is quiet for a moment, and Newt can see the gears turning in his head as he searches for the best way to formulate his answer. Not the best start, to be entirely honest. Finally, Janson says, “No. There are many others,” and Newt doesn’t know why, but he laughs.

“So that’s it then. You’re tossing everyone out on the street.”

“Newt, like I said –”

“We signed a contract – No,” Newt says, when Janson tries to talk over him, “You and your people _signed a contract._ Protection and enough resources to live if we went through your fucking program.”

Janson takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. “I really think we should wait for the rest –”

Newt stands up, and watches as Janson’s posture stiffens at the sudden change. A second later Thomas follows him.

Newt says, “That’s what WCKD promised. A fortnight of – of that, and we would be given enough food and shelter to survive until whenever the planet decides to give up.”

Janson is standing how, too. He gestures to the rest of their surroundings – the tall, white walls, the marble floors, the stone fireplace, and furniture that looks like it had been handcrafted by extra-terrestrials – like one of those neurotic game show hosts on television that Brenda likes to watch, sans the smile. 

“Understand that this goes a little beyond shelter,” Janson says, and Newt feels something inside of him snap.

“We didn’t want this _castle!”_ Newt shouts. He hasn’t felt this angry in years. “We wanted four walls and a roof! You’re people stuck us in here and said it would be fine!”

Janson holds his palms up. “That was the wrong choice of words, I apologise. And yes, WCKD made a grievous error in giving you this home, I acknowledge this and deeply apologise, boys. We thought it would be alright, that was our mistake. And it was, for a while, but circumstances change,” Janson says, cupping his hands together, “They do. I am terribly sorry that this has happened. It is the last thing we ever wanted, I can promise you that.”

Newt scoffs, “Yeah, just because you keep saying that doesn’t make it true.”

“What’s the next step?” Thomas asks. His nails are digging into Newt’s arm, whether he realises or not. “If we can’t stay here anymore, where are we supposed to go?”

Janson pauses as if he hoped this question somehow wouldn’t come up, and says, “We don’t have a backup, for the time being.”

“Bullshit,” Newt says, “Stick us in one of the towers in LA. I know you have plenty of those, I had to look at them every day for five whole years.” 

“We do not have the room.”

Newt feels like he is losing his mind. “How do you not have the room?” he says, “You can’t just throw us out –!”

This time Janson is the one to cut him off. “I’m afraid we can,” he says, and all of the pleasantries float off into the air and evaporate before their eyes. “And we have to. I was hoping it would have to be this way, but plainly speaking, boys, this isn’t your home anymore. All funding has as of one hour ago been cut. If you don’t leave the premises by tomorrow morning, you will all be escorted out.”


	3. The Storm

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please note warnings that apply to this chapter: Graphic descriptions of injuries, references to child abuse, talk of suicide and prostitution, and a very brief mention of pedophilia.

Colorado, Newt thinks, is quite beautiful.

He’d been skeptical in the beginning, when Winston first suggested traveling east, too used to the clouded, smog-filled familiarity of the American west coast. Sonya had also shared the same reservations, but Winston had reassured her – voice cracking through static over the walkie-talkie Gally nabbed from a gas station before they left Nevada – that it would be okay. There is a house, he says, nestled in a field between rolling hills and twin mountains behind them. It is far from any city and, quite literally, off the grid.

“How do you ever know about this place?” Minho asks from behind the wheel because they, by some planetary miracle, managed to keep the cars.

(Sonya had trudged up to the house, loose hairs sticking to the back of her neck and flushed cheeks. Newt had been standing on the porch as WCKD were leaving, and one van remained parked on the street where it would stay there until morning just to make sure they left, when he saw her. 

“Where is everyone?” Newt asked, running up to meet her before she could get any closer to the house, shoes scraping to a halt against the concrete. Sonya jumped back in surprise.

“Oh!” She said, “Down at the gas station. There was an issue with the cards, or something, so Fry had to pay with cash. And then Brenda was inside for, like, twenty minutes because she found these chic pea things and couldn’t decide between salted or unsalted, so in the end we had to –”

“Sonya,” Newt cut her off.

“What?” She had frowned at the look on Newt’s face, “What’s wrong?”

Newt told her everything, watched as her mouth dropped open and eyes widened in horror, tears of denial filling her eyes. He sent her back, ponytail swinging as she ran back down the hill, to stop them from coming back. Newt still isn’t quite sure where Brenda hid the jeep that day, or how they managed to smuggle the other out of the garage that same night without the WCKD officer stationed outside their house noticing, but perhaps someone or something had been watching over them.)

Winston, sitting shotgun up the front of the eight-seater, head against the glass and watching the countryside roll past, quietly confessed, “I used to live there.”

The car falls quiet. Behind Newt, Gally shuffles awkwardly in his seat, legs too long for the small space, and on his left Teresa sleeps on against Thomas’ shoulder.

Thomas asks, “Did you grow up here?”

Winston says, “My parents were farmers,” and does not elaborate further, eyes trained on the road, unconsciously chewing on a thumbnail, the conversation very much over.

Newt leans back in his seat and fidgets with Thomas’ fingers.

There used to be a lot of farmers here before WCKD bought them all out in order to control the mass market. Newt closes his eyes and breathes in and out deeply. It must come out shaky because Thomas’ fingers tighten around his, and Newt openes his eyes again to find Thomas staring out him, penetrating and concerned.

“Okay?” he whispers and Newt, a lump in his throat, simply nods.

Newt’s father was also a farmer before he met his mother.

The car falls into silence for the next hour, the only chatter apart from the old radio being Gally and Jeff in the back seat, Teresa’s occasional sleeping noises, and Frypan checking in with Winston over the speaker. The sun has set, and Newt is beginning to doze off himself, Thomas a warm comfort pressed against his side when Teresa suddenly jerks awake, nearly giving them all heart attacks.

“What?” Minho gasps from the driver’s seat, hands white-knuckled on the steering wheel.

Teresa blinks around the interior of the car for a long moment as she gathers her bearings, pulling a strand of hair from her mouth. “Oh,” she says, relaxing back against the seat and rubbing sleep from her eyes, “Nothing. I just remembered it’s Thomas’ birthday today.”

Thomas stares at her. From this angle, Newt is unable to make out the expression on his face, but judging from the look on Teresa’s, it must not have been pleasant.

After a breath, during which they all take a moment to unclench, Gally falls back into his seat with a huff and a small, non-humorous laugh. “Geez,” he says, “_Mazel tov_, happy farm, you’re legally as fucked over as the rest of us.”

Thomas remains silent.

Newt stares at the sky in the distance, watching the long, winding road disappear into shadows as the world grows dark around them. Thomas’ face is draped in them when he laces his fingers around Newt’s on his lap, dragging Newt’s attention toward him once again. Newt lifts Thomas’ hand to his lips and kisses the back of it, and chooses not to think about the palpable relief in Thomas’ eyes.

Winston leans forward in his seat and grasps the walkie-talkie off of the dashboard. “Fry, take a left at the next exit,” he says. After a second, Frypan’s confirming hum hisses through the car. The radio sings,_ I am just going over Jordan.__ I'm just going over home ..._

The farmhouse is small and two story, with an open conservatory in the front, and bleached white from the sun. It does, in fact, sit nestled between two wide, rolling hills that are framed by the mountains in the distance, with a short, mile-long driveway and a large, long since abandoned crop field to the left. The early morning light creates a patchwork jigsaw puzzle on the earth through fluffy clouds above, and Newt’s eyes rove across the landscape to settle on a lone fig tree a few yards to the right of the house, sitting on its own solitary hill as if it settled there decades ago and hasn’t since felt the desire to move, the view too beautiful to give up. 

In the driver’s seat, Winston’s hand briefly appears between the front seats to brush against Jeff’s arm, now in shotgun, to wake him.

“We’re here,” Winston says.

Newt doesn’t think he has ever seen this much dust collectively in one area in his life. There is not one inch of the house that isn’t coated in layers of grime in an alarming variance of viscosity; a thin sheen of grey coats the hardwood floor and streak through the house, and linoleum in the kitchen, while the dining table displays a movie scene from the past with cookie-cutter shapes of plates and cups. Hills of dirt form above the mantlepiece.

Newt holds firmly on to the back of Thomas’ jacket as they walk through the house, scared to make a false step, his other hand wrapped firmly around Minho’s wrist. Every nerve in his body is alight with flammable paranoia. It is as if he expects something to jump out at him from a blind spot – an animal or, perhaps, those creatures that live and move with the dust storms, the ones who exist in urban legends.

His fears are far from quelled when Harriet’s voice calls out from further into the house. They find her standing before a set up of blankets that have been pushed up against a wall, others rolled up into makeshift pillows, and a pile of shoes.

“Squatters?” Sonya says, voice small beside Newt, who finds himself wishing he had a third arm to wrap around her shoulders.

Frypan kneels down to inspect the supplies. Gally idly toes at the pile of shoes with a sour look.

“These ’ve been here a while,” Fry says, “Whoever was living here is long gone.”

“Yay?” Brenda says, eyes darting to the back door nervously.

“Sweet,” Minho claps his hands, “So, uh, who’s going to help me board up the windows and doors tonight?”

Teresa turns around the small hallway and asks, “Where did Winston and Jeff go?”

They find them easily enough. The two are standing in the middle of the small family room, Winston standing before a squat coffee table where he holds a picture frame in his hands. As he stares, back tense, body unmoving, Jeff’s hand is heavy on his shoulder.

A weighted kind of sadness settles inside Newt at that moment, as he watches at Winston stare down at the picture of his family. He imagines that if he were to have one, he would feel much like Winston is most likely feeling at that moment. Looking at a photograph of someone who has been so surely wiped from life is like looking through a window into another universe, one where they still exist, and exist happily, forever smiling as widely as they are in that photo.

Newt’s mother never liked photos. When Newt was small, she told him that to let someone take your picture is to hand them over a piece of your soul. It was a superstition carried with her from childhood, which she stuck with a stubborn demeanor like she did most things. There were never pictures of any of them, no photos of his parents lovingly embracing, none of a baby Newt struggling to sit up, and certainly no happy, smiley family portraits.

The only remaining photograph that Newt has of his mother and father are the ones which exist solely in his head.

No one had ever taken Newt’s picture until WCKD. 

Thomas coughs, suddenly, bending over and rushing to pull his collar over his nose and mouth, and with a start, Newt realises that he probably shouldn’t be lingering in here. The interruption jolts Winston from his daze as well, and he puts the photo back face down on the table.

“Okay,” he says, brushing the dirt on his palms against his jeans, “I say we get this dumpster cleaned up. Who’s with me?”

As it turns out, this house had been a hot spot for wanderers over the past decade. The two upstairs bedrooms reveal many more setups like the one hall downstairs. There are empty boxes of food and cans of beans in the kitchen, and old, moth-eaten clothes in the bathroom. It takes a full day of all of them working every minute to scrub and clean the house free of dust. By the time the sun sets the towels tied around Newt’s nose and mouth doesn’t seem to make a single fuck of a difference, as he is periodically running outside to cough and hack, spitting into the brown grass with his eyes watering. Thomas had been permanently banished from the house five or six hours in when he developed a stuttering wheeze with every cough.

The highlight of the day, when the sun has set and the moon is staring down at them, comes when Winston brings up a box from the basement. Inside they find a transmitter radio the size of a small microwave, which Winston deposits on to the table along with two pocket-size receivers.

“This thing,” Winston begins, slapping the top of the radio proudly, “is what my parents used to use when one of ‘em would go into the city to drop off stock. It might not look like much, but this baby has a range of 100 to 150 miles.”

Newt raises his eyebrows, impressed. Jeff whistles.

“Well,” Jeff says, “That’ll come in handy for supply runs.”

Winston grins, “Fuck yeah, it will. Also.” He flips a switch, and the room instantly fills with music. Classic and old-timey, brushed with static, and extraordinarily familiar. 

They leave the radio by the window. Music and an old, scratchy voice greet Newt when he walks out onto the porch in the early hours of the morning. The clouds in the sky part like theatre curtains to welcome the rising sun. He finds Teresa sitting in the open conservatory, slouched in a chair and watching the sunrise. He falls into the seat beside her, one eye still shut and covered by his hair.

“Morning,” Newt says, yawning.

Teresa smiles. “Good morning, Newt,” she says, “How’s he doing?”

“Okay, I think,” Newt says, rubbing his eyes, “Still pretty out of it. Whatever Jeff gave him really knocked a punch.”

Last night, after a dinner of Frypan’s best canned beans, Thomas nearly coughed up one of his lungs before throwing up over the side of the porch. Newt rubbed his back and waited until he was done before helping him inside, where he proceeded to collapse on one of the faded blue loveseats in exhaustion. Jeff, unbeknownst to literally every single one of them, had swindled some medicine from a local pharmacy back in Vegas a couple days before they left, and brought all of it with him in a single backpack. He emptied this bag on the table to reveal what looked like a year’s worth of all the medicine and pain drugs you could possibly dream of.

Minho nearly doubled over with laughter while the others looked a mixture of confused and impressed and, beside him, Winston bristled with glowing fondness and pride.

Newt helped lift Thomas’ head as Jeff fed him a vial of something clear to drink, and he has been knocked out ever since, snuggled peacefully under a thin blanket.

“Good,” Teresa nods, pulling the blanket draped around her shoulders tighter, “Let him sleep, he needs it. The day after is always rough and – I don’t know why I’m telling you all this, you already know.” 

Newt flashes back to nights of Thomas coughing to the point of passing out followed by bleak, somber days of Thomas looking so week and fragile Newt worried that a simple touch alone would shatter him into pieces.

Newt shakes the images from his mind and breathes deeply.

“The air is clearer out here,” he says, “Less pollution, and far from the city. Not to mention there are only miles of farmland. Winston couldn’t have brought us to a better place.”

The pink and orange hues of the sunrise reflect off Teresa’s face, making her skin look flushed and vivid, her eyes bright. They watch it together for a minute, revelling in comfortable silence as the radio host chatters on behind them (so very familiar) until eventually Teresa sighs and says, “I hope you’re right.”

Newt looks at Teresa, consciously tugging her blanket further around her shoulders for comfort, bundled just under her chin, and remembers their shared room at The Project facility.

“I am right,” Newt says, reaching out to nudge her with the back of his hand, “You wanna know why I’m right?”

Teresa slowly turns to meet his gaze. The host chatters on.

“Why?” She says.

“Because,” Newt grins, pointing at the radio behind them, “_Country Roads_.”

Teresa looks profoundly confused for the briefest moments before the announcer stops talking and the music begins, the opening verse of the song they listened to together a million times in that hospital room following.

Teresa’s jaw drops open. “No,” she says.

“Yes.”

“_No_.”

“_Yes_.”

“How –” Teresa stutters, “How did you remember? Oh my god, this _man! _He played this song five times a fucking day, I don’t –!”

Newt sings, “_To the place, I belong –”_

Teresa plugs her ears, squeezing her eyes shut as if she is in physical pain. “Please,” she begs, “Please, Newt, I can’t.”

“_West Virginia!_ _Mountain mama__, take me home –”_

Teresa makes a noise between a squeak and a groan and covers her entire head with the blanket in hopes of drowning both Newt and the radio out. Newt presses his fist to his mouth and tries not to laugh too loud, as Thomas is still sleeping.

–

The first month is the most difficult.

The food situation is one of the biggest factors, having only managed to take as much from the house on Paradise Hill as they could carry; small rations to get them by for as long as they can manage to stretch it. The ingredients and produce Fry bring with him from the house had been a good idea in theory rather than practice, as he very quickly realised that just because he had the facilities to use them back at the house, doesn’t mean he has them here.

Newt once found him sadly glaring at a row of condiments on the old, swamp green colour of the kitchen benchtops.

He looked at Newt and said, “We got used to that life too fast, didn’t we?”

Give a street rat a palace to roam and a warm, comfortable bed, and you’d be surprised how quickly he forgets what life once was. 

In between periodical trips into town for food (Gally, apparently, is a Class A thief) Winston takes on the task of teaching everyone to farm. Seeds are found in an old shed that has seen better days, around the back of the crop field, that has magically remained locked for the entire decade the farm has been abandoned. They plant corn and potatoes, tomatoes and cabbages, organised neatly into impressive fields of rows. 

Three months in and the crops are healthy and thriving. The cornfield stands tall and proud way over Newt’s head. On warmer days he and Thomas take to lying among the sprouts, cool beneath their shade, watching the fluffy clouds gently blow past.

White clouds. There are only white, cotton candy clouds out here. Blue skies that grow richer in vibrancy as the day goes on.

Beside him, Thomas is quiet, eyes closed. He is breathing better, these days.

There has not been a single dust storm in months.

Newt thinks this is where they were always going to end up, and where they needed to be.

“Wait, wait, wait,” Jeff raises both his voice and his hands in the air, attempting to shout over everyone talking at the same time. A futile fete, as far as Newt is concerned, as even he, five drinks into the night and leaning on Thomas’ shoulder while grasping Minho’s arm to keep him in a generally upright position, and is struggling to keep the bubbly laughter down to the octave that is considered _polite table manner_.

They sit on the porch under the night sky and tell stories from each other’s past. Brenda is in the middle of recounting the story of her time in South America where she lived until the age of twelve, before moving to the north with her uncle. The story is wild, to say the least, and Jeff is having some trouble.

“So, you’re telling me,” he continues, voice raised, using Winston’s knees as a prestigious lounge, “that you seriously lived with a traveling circus?”

“Yep,” Brenda says, proudly. 

“Seriously?” Frypan says, tone dubious.

Brenda nods, slapping the porch vigorously to help carry the point across. “Uh huh,” she says, “I did – I am 100% telling the truth, I am!” she yells over half the group’s disbelief.

Jeff shakes his head, eyes wide. On Newt’s left Minho heckles loudly, obviously on Brenda’s side and believing her completely, from minute one, while on his right Thomas laughs quietly into his soda.

“I’m sorry,” Harriet chimes in, “But a traveling circus? Those still exist?”

“Totally,” Brenda says, “It’s good entertainment and, I don’t know, people gotta get their rocks off somehow.”

Sonya wrinkles her nose, “Okay, ew.”

“No, really! Do you know how many creepy old guys I saw –”

Gally, knocking his empty can against the wood three times, cries, “Yeah! We’re not doing that,” and thus opens the gate to another round of obnoxiously inebriated laughter.

“So, what did you used to do?” Teresa asks, tracing her finger around the rim of an empty beer bottle (she stopped drinking after she forced Thomas to when he began to cough too much, as it was only fair. Newt almost did, too, but then Thomas gave him a _look_ and opened his next drink for him).

“I was a contortionist,” Brenda explains, proudly. “Me and Jorge kept up the acts for a few years after, but then it got a little hard. But, hey, it was fun while it lasted, and you wouldn’t believe how much someone would pay just to see you drink out of a straw with both your ankles behind your head.”

Teresa’s eyebrows twitch upwards, muttering a simple _Oh_ in response. Minho snorts into his drink, and she leans back and slaps him.

“Well, I think it’s awesome,” Sonya says, and innocently asks, “Can you still perform?” to which Brenda merely shrugs and takes another sip, mouth quirked.

“Maybe,” she says and, with Newt’s fuzzy vision, he is unsure whether she winks at Minho or Teresa.

Sonya shakes her head, astonished. “That’s amazing.”

“Can you give a demonstration sometime?” Minho asks and someone, probably Harriet, kicks him,. He proceeds to make a whole show of yelping and rubbing his foot because Minho is a giant dramaturgic when he wants to be. Newt rolls his eyes and pats him on the back.

Sometime after everyone has calmed down a little and Newt’s vision has begun to sharpen in the corners once again, Minho turns to Sonya.

“What about you, blondie?” he asks, “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say, but after you fell from heaven, of course, where did you crawl up here from?”

The group grows quiet when Sonya doesn’t reply right away. Something about her expression, or the way she hunches her shoulders in on herself, hair falling from behind her ear and doing nothing to move it back as if it helps shield her from the gazes of everyone who is now staring at her. It strikes a chord inside of Newt, and he leans forward and tells her, “You don’t have to.”

This seems to wake her up out of whatever reverie she was in. Sonya shakes her head, securing the loose hair behind her ear, and says, “No, it’s okay. I came over here from Denver.”

The night carries on loud around them, while everyone has turned silent. Someone knocks over an empty can, and they scramble to catch it.

“The last city?” Gally says, deliberately. The city of Denver is commonly referred to by non-residents as The Last City. This is because if, in the random occurrence of a meteoroid strike from space, one large enough to wipe out the entirety of the planet in one hit, that city and it’s hundred-foot, titanium steel walls would be the only thing left.

Sonya nods, picking at her thumbnail.

Newt looks her over. It’s true that she’s always stood out among the group, in the way that her skin is too untouched, her hair too long and healthy and darker at the roots, but he always passed it off as nothing. Simple luck. He thought maybe she lived with some parents who recently passed, forcing her to join the Program in lieu of dying of starvation.

Newt admittedly doesn’t have a lot of knowledge when it comes to the Last City, but he does know that the people who live there are either rich to begin with, or had parents who were, or worked. In various kinds of ways.

Sonya picks at her nail and sighs. “Yep. There. I was a, uh,” she makes a face, “The closest thing I can call it was an escort. And because I know you’re thinking it, no, it wasn’t the same as being a hooker. I met with someone and got paid to pretend to know them and hang out with them for a few hours.”

“I’ve heard of those,” Fry says, voice quiet, “But. Don’t you have to be, like, an adult to be a part of that?”

Sonya makes a face, “Yeah, well, the place I worked at didn’t exactly do everything by the book. They changed my status on the registry, bumping me up two years. That’s how I was able to join the program, by the way. If any of you were wondering.”

Newt blinks. Sonya hasn’t tried to hide the fact that she is only sixteen years old, while the rest of them sit on eighteen to twenty. It had just slipped his mind. Newt always wondered how Sonya managed to slip past the gates of the Calisto Project while being alone and under the age of eighteen, but felt it was not his place to pry.

Beside Newt, Thomas’ breathing turns strange.

“I lived in a house with about fifty other girls and boys,” Sonya continues, “Each morning we’d wake up and check the board for our daily assignments. It was okay, for the most part. Decent pay and the agency I worked with took care of food and stuff like that, so. Yeah.” She fiddles with the end of her hair as she talks. Newt is faintly aware of holding his breath as he listens. “I was someone’s friend, or sister, or daughter or girlfriend. And it was mostly predictable, you know, the people who would hire us were lonely or sad, or just needed someone to talk to. I liked it for that, you know? Being able to be there for a stranger, and make them feel even just a little bit better.

“There was this man,” she pauses a beat. “A regular. Victor. He was actually my favourite. He was always friendly, and nice, never, you know, tried anything like some of the others. Every time we met I was his daughter. My name was Monica, and it was always the same story – I’d be visiting from college out of town, and we would meet for coffee or dinner, and then he would drop me at the airport and say goodbye. Every time.”

Sonya’s voice shifts, lower, and her finger traces circular patterns in the dirt caught against the old wood. She slowly becomes lost in her own story.

“I never thought anything of it, you know. I just figured he was like the others; lonely. Never had a wife or kids but maybe wanted them, and this was a fantasy that he had in his head. We must have met about two dozen times. It got to the point where I could pick the day and just _know_ what script would be waiting for me in my locker. And I liked it at first, honestly. I liked seeing Victor and having coffee with him. It felt like a break, like almost something … normal. God,” she huffs, “Sometimes I let myself pretend that _I_ was normal, and Victor was actually my dad.

“Three months go by and I’m meeting Victor at least once a week, sometimes twice. And every time it was the _same exact story_. One day I got curious. I wanted to know more about Victor, but breaking script on the clock was cause for suspension or immediate dismissal, in some cases, for anything other than an emergency. There was a boy who worked in the administration section who had a crush on me, so I knew I’d be able to convince him to slip some information under the table. They had background checks on all the people who sign up, obviously, to make sure there weren’t any creeps, so he ended up giving me Victor’s file.

“Turns out Monica, the girl I was always pretending to be – did actually exist. Or, she used to. About ten years ago she came to town to visit her dad on a free week from college in Madrid. They had lunch, they talked, and then afterward he went and dropped her off at the airport, and they said goodbye.” Sonya takes a deep breath, and says, “There was a terrorist attack. The plane went down that day, and every single person on board died.”

Sonya goes on before anyone can make a sound, “The next time I saw him, everything was different. Not Victor, he was exactly the same, but _I_ was different. When his three hours were up and we were at the airport, we said goodbye like normal and I started to walk toward the gates, and then I stopped.”

Sonya closes her eyes and shakes her head, whispering, “I should have just kept walking.”

Gently, Harriet asks, “What happened?”

“I broke script.” Sonya says, “I turned around and told him that his daughter was dead, and that he needed to let her go. And –” her voice cracks, “And then he started to cry, and I just walked out the front doors and left him there.”

Someone swears. Newt’s vision begins to whiten in the corners. Thomas’ thigh rests flush against his. Minho is very still.

“I’m not proud of what I did,” Sonya admits, “I should have just refused to see Victor again, but I didn’t. In my head, I thought a hard push is what he needed, that maybe it would wake him up.” She rubs her temple and takes a deep, shaky breath, the whites of her eyes pink. “I didn’t see him until about a week later, when he broke into my room in the middle of the night with a gun. He must’ve followed me back to the house.

“He was shouting, and crying, and I was trying to calm him down. I remember him telling me that he knew I wasn’t his daughter, and I’ll never be his daughter, and that I was right. And then he shot himself in the head.” Sonya closes her eyes. Brenda has tear stains down her cheeks, and Newt doesn’t think Fry has blinked in about a minute. Winston’s jaw hangs slack.

Sonya finishes her story with, “A couple days later I left the house for an assignment, stole a car and drove to the Callisto Project. The end.”

The night air is so thick that Newt can almost taste it, as everyone sitting around the circle slowly begins to come back into their bodies. Newt glances toward Sonya, who leans in over her knees solemnly but does not give off the impression that she needs or wants comfort. Minho presses his fist to his eye and breathes shakily.

While everyone struggles to think of what to say while their brains catch up in the meantime, after being rudely shocked half way into sobriety, Sonya stands and, just before excusing herself for the night, says, “Listen, guys, I don’t want you to feel sorry for me. As fucked up as it sounds … if that hadn’t happened, I would still be there, in that house.”

_I would still be a dead girl_, goes unsaid.

Harriet follows her off, and it isn’t until the sound of their joint footsteps have faded that Minho drops his head into his hands and swears. As Brenda tries to talk him down (_Jesus fucking Christ_, Minho says. _It’s not your fault_, Brenda says. _I shouldn’t have asked_, Minho says. _You didn’t know_, Brenda says.) everyone left deflates all at once.

“I need another drink,” Winston groans, shoulders slumped. 

“I don’t,” Jeff wrinkles his nose, pushing a half-empty bottle away from him.

“Well,” Fry’s says, rising to his feet, “I’m calling it a night. See y’all in the morning. Maybe.”

With a half-hearted salute, he is off, and one by one the rest of the group makes their own way upstairs. Minho claps Newt and Thomas on the shoulders and Teresa ruffles their hair as the two of them leave.

“You okay?” Thomas asks him, when they’re getting ready for bed. “You’ve been pretty quiet.” Newt snaps out of his haze and glances up at the sound of Thomas’ voice. Blinking, Newt is embarrassed to find that he has been standing in the same spot for a while, staring out at the dark horizon with his pants unfastened.

Newt hums, shaking himself out of his daze. “You’ve been quiet all night,” he says, moving forward to brush away an eyelash fallen onto Thomas’ cheek.

Thomas shrugs, and pulls on Newt’s T-shirt to bring him closer, “Fair enough.”

They prepare their bed on the couch the same as they do every night, and as Newt lies with his ear pressed to Thomas’ chest, the sound of his heartbeat banishes the long-forgotten echoes of gunshots ringing inside his head.

–

Privacy is a concept of the past.

The funny little condition of cramming eleven people into a small two-bedroom-one-bathroom is that there is no room for one person to be alone in the house at one time. Newt can count on one hand the number of times this week he has used the toilet while at least one other person brushed their teeth five feet away from him. Half the group has resigned to working on the crops or locking themselves in the bathroom when it is not in use for some semblance of privacy, while the others have learnt to enjoy the outdoors far more.

It isn’t too hard out here, however it has rained three out of the five days this week so far, thus imprisoning the entire group indoors for the majority of the time. While watching the rain spread across the land and the crops self-watering is nice and relaxing, the weather gives the house an unpleasant smell of mildew, and leaves behind a tacky, wet feeling in the air. 

Apart from the overwhelming lack of personal space, the small confines are also an issue in other areas of life.

No amount of staring at the bright landscape until his eyes burn will wipe the image from Newt’s mind of opening the pantry door (looking for spare blankets, because Brenda had them last and of course she can’t remember where she put them) and finding Jeff up on the counter, Winston between his knees, hands up the back of his shirt and pants around his ankles. The slam of the door rattled the light fixture, in tune with Newt’s fervent apologies as he ran away.

Newt rolls off the couch and falls in a heap of blankets on the floor when, one morning, the sound of footsteps bounding down the stairs startles him so hard he launches himself away from Thomas (ankles locked around Newt’s lower back, hands under the waistband of his shorts and teeth biting bruising marks into the skin of Newt’s neck, very unquestionably grinding in direct line of sight of the bottom stair landing) and spends the remainder of the day hot and frustrated.

Thomas and his freckled cheeks and trim waist and pink lips do not help _one fucking bit_. 

(Newt almost wishes he had walked in on Sonya and Harriet in an incriminating position other than the one he found them in: outside, lounged on the porch swing and lying facing one another, their eyes closed as they whispered softly to one another, their foreheads pressed together. Harriet’s fingers thread themselves into Sonya’s golden hair and Sonya’s hand rested on Harriet’s chest, over her heart. Newt slipped back inside as quietly as he could. Neither girl had noticed he was there.)

The weather is cooling but not fast enough, as Newt finds himself in the fields watering crops, planting seeds and peeling corn leaves, more frustrated than ever. Sonya’s lively chatter is pleasantly distracting right up until Newt looks up and sees Thomas at the edge of the crops, shirt pulled up to his face to wipe away sweat and exposing tan skin and a toned stomach, and that’s the end of that. 

Turns out Newt isn’t the only one feeling the pressure, as one afternoon Thomas barrels out the back door just as Newt is coming inside, grabs his wrist and starts pulling him back toward the cornfield where he came from.

“Tommy?” Newt starts, feet tripping over dirt to keep up.

“Everybody’s inside,” Thomas says, as they enter the field. Thomas does not let up until they’re a bit of a way into the field, and when he finally stops it is beside the small gap in the crops where they’ve erected a scarecrow (Melvin, his name is, made from straw and some of the old clothes the squatters left behind). Melvin rises high above Newt’s head, as do the corn stalks, their leaves softly fluttering in the wind. Thomas pushes Newt against the scarecrow and kisses him, firm and pointedly, and Newt understands, then.

“They won’t come out?” Newt asks between kisses when his mouth is free, which isn’t a large window of time.

Thomas shakes his head and trails his lips down the column of Newt’s throat, pressing closer until his knee slips between Newt’s thighs. Newt forgets how to breathe.

“Nope,” Thomas says, continuing his journey down to Newt’s collarbone, pulling at the neckline of his shirt to expose more skin.

Newt grips Thomas’ shoulders to try and anchor himself, and says, “You’re sure?”

“Do you actually care? Right now?” Thomas asks, tugging at Newt’s belt, and yeah, okay, he makes a pretty convincing argument.

“Now that you mention it,” Newt says, bringing Thomas back up to his lips, “Not in the slightest.”

After a minute Thomas breaks away, pressing his cheek to Newt’s and allowing them both to breathe for a moment. Every nerve ending in his body feels like it’s on fire; the rest of the world floats off into a distant blur, and all he can feel and see and _knows_ is Thomas.

“I want you,” Thomas says, against his cheek.

“Okay,” Newt says.

“I mean, like, now. Badly.”

“I said okay.”

Thomas groans, “Fuck,” and he’s dropping to his knees, and he’s pulling Newt’s pants down around his calves, and then Newt’s cock is in his mouth and Newt is reaching out, desperately, for purchase against the wooden post that holds up the scarecrow.

Thomas pulls a small bottle out of his shoe (half empty, one Newt recognises from their days back at the Vegas house) and he lets Thomas fuck him against the post, not caring, so beyond caring and just wanting to _feel _so much that he thinks he may lose his mind from it. The corners of the world are curling in on themselves and Newt couldn’t care less. Thomas pressed against his back feels like heaven. The feeling of his breath against Newt’s skin and his soft moans in Newt’s ear, their fingers laced together against the post feels infinite in its perfection.

Thomas is easily the best thing Newt has ever seen, and he never wants this to end, he never wants to not be touching him, or kissing him, or feeling the warmth of his body against his own. Newt thinks if he found a way to spend eternity with Thomas he would take it and never look back.

This, and the moments that follow: when they are lying in the field, side by side, as the wind caresses their skin, and the corn stalks whisper amongst themselves. They’re naked, and the sun filtered between the stalks feels warm against his skin. It casts faint, leopard print shadows over Thomas’ body.

“I have something to tell you,” Newt says.

“Okay,” Thomas says, stupid smile still plastered on his face that Newt doesn’t think will he going anywhere, anytime soon. Thomas’ hands are splayed over Newt’s chest, thumbs rubbing circles into his skin. He hasn’t stopped touching him. “What is it?”

Newt softly pokes a rosy cheek with the tip of his finger, chasing the flush down to his jaw. “Guess,” he says.

Thomas’ eyebrows furrow a moment. “Alright,” he begins, “Um. You’re allergic to grass, and now you’re having a severe reaction and you’re trying to figure out how to tell me?”

Newt scoffs, rolling his eyes, “No. Try again.”

“Fry somehow managed to recreate maple syrup with corn stalks and fig trees?”

Newt laughs, “Uh. No? But who knows what that one’s capable of, really.”

Thomas continues, “Gally’s secretly an alien and you know about it, and now you’re telling me because you saw him glowing out by the fig tree. But we have to wait for him to confess otherwise it’ll be too awkward.”

“What?” Newt laughs, “_No_, Thomas.”

“Really? Because I have theories.”

“Tommy.”

Thomas groans and wriggles closer, hands roving over Newt’s ribs to rest against the space between his shoulders. “Just tell me, then,” he says.

“Okay,” Newt says, “I love you.”

The earth stands still as the breath catches in Thomas’ throat and his eyes grow wide, leaving Newt to wait, equally as breathless, until it begins its rotation once again. It happens with one bat of Thomas’ eyelashes, and then with the second and third, and finally when his mouth stretches into a smile and he says, “Oh. Good. Because I love you, too.”

Like sunlight on alabaster stone after it rains, like the small vacuum of warmth and comfort in the eye of a storm, where the end of the world may as well be happening all around you, but you couldn’t have a care in the world because here – right here – is where it is calm and safe and easy. That’s what knowing Thomas and falling in love with him is like, and, Newt thinks, this is where his entire life has been leading to.

When news comes over the radio of a dust storm ravaging the county area, Minho and Gally disappear into town for two hours and return with a carload of tarps to cover to crops with, if they should ever need them. Newt and Sonya spend an entire morning fastening the tarps to the wooden pegs the others nailed into the ground. The sight is awe-inducing; great white fabric spread across the field from one end to the other, billowing in the wind like a giant, deflated hot air balloon. Everyone eats dinner on the porch that evening, watching the sunset over their new home.

The radio chatters in the background all day, every day, giving them radar updates on dust storms surrounding the county and outer-county area, and for a while that is all it is; gathering on the porch or sitting in the kitchen, while a monotone announcer tells them of a dust storm passing over the LA district. They continue to be relatively lucky as they have been for the couple months they have lived here, using up their quota of luck that the universe has provided them with, probably feeling bad after the clusterfuck that was the WCKD house, until it begins to run out.

It happens on a nondescript Thursday. The sky has been a shone down on them a dull wheat colour all day, the kind of sky which gives you the promise and illusion of protection from the sun without ever delivering. The wind picks up when Sonya is flicking baby spuds at the back of Newt’s neck, pink from the glare of the filtered sun, but it never strikes them as anything unusual until later.

The wind bends the tall corn nearly in half as it tosses them to and fro, threatening to rip the stalks out of the ground with its force. Birds fly overhead, their wings clapping in their haste, and Newt, potato basket weighing him down, looks back toward the field just in time to see Melvin the Scarecrow’s hat fly off his head and be carried off far.

This is also when Jeff and Frypan run on to the porch and proceed to slam pots and pans together with wooden spoons above their heads, shouting at the top of their lungs.

Behind Newt, Sonya gasps. A potato rolls off the hefty pile in her basket and falls to the ground, bouncing by Newt’s feet, and his blood runs cold.

There is a dust storm in the valley, bigger than he has seen in a long time.

Chaos breaks.

Newt and Sonya run into the house with their baskets just as Teresa bursts through the front door and joins in on waving her arms about, shouting at everyone to hurry up and get inside. An orchestrated chaos of song and dance ensues inside the house, as the second Newt walks through the front door he is instantly jostled to the side by Gally and Brenda pushing past into the kitchen, buckets in hand. Newt spies through the window and scopes the crop patches and accompanied fields surrounding. Thomas had been working out there with Minho and Harriet earlier. Now, he sees no sign of any of them. 

“Get as much as you can and bring it down to the basement!” Teresa shouts, coming up behind him, “We’re going to need every last bucket. Quickly!”

“Teresa,” Newt starts.

Teresa leans past him, moving further into the house, “Winston!”

From the kitchen, Winston shouts, “Here!”

“What’s the situation with the basement?”

“Built as a cellar,” Winston confirms, “We used it during storms like this. It was up to regulation about ten years so, but it doesn’t look too worn. It’ll hold!”

Minho runs into sight, and Newt leaves Teresa to bark orders and heads for him.

“Minho!” Newt calls, seeing him stop at the end of the hall at the sound of his name. His face is coated in a sheen of sweat, his eyes filled with a wild determination. Newt jogs up to him, “Where’s Thomas?”

“I saw him head upstairs,” Minho says, adjusting the bundle of blankets in his arms. Harriet and Jeff scurry past, water sloshing in the pots and buckets they hold, barely managing to stay inside. Newt quickly thanks Minho and runs upstairs, where he finds Thomas in one of the bedrooms collecting any kind of cloth that he can.

“Tommy,” Newt starts, his breath coming out of him in a faintly breathless puff. Thomas looks up, bent over where he is scooping up someone’s discarded t-shirt. His shoulders relax when he sees Newt, straightening out and moving over to him.

“These should be enough for everyone,” Thomas says. He hands a shirt to Newt, who accepts it gratefully before taking half of the pile that is in Thomas’ arms.

“Split up,” Newt says, walking back out the door with Thomas at his heels, “Hand these around to everyone and start hauling water.”

Downstairs Teresa is still launched headfirst into survival mode, moving from window to window with Gally and Sonya at her side, working to secure them with tape and any kind of cloth or towel they can find. Newt hands them shirts and other clothing to tie around their noses and mouths as Thomas works on the group coming in and out of the basement. Newt stops Minho in the hallway, armful of bean cans and graham crackers, to secure a shirt around his face. Minho’s eyes squint thankfully at him as he ties the knot securely at the back of his head.

It is getting harder to breathe, now. They need to get a move on soon. Newt is about to shout as much to the group, pulling the towel around his mouth taught against his skin, when a shout comes from the front of the house.

Sonya is gasping, and Jeff shouts, “_Winston!_”, and Newt looks out in horror to find Winston running down the porch steps, arm over his eyes against the wind, heading toward the crop field.

In all their haste they have forgotten to secure the tarps. All of their food will be destroyed. 

“What is he doing?” Gally asks, coughing. A few of the others are doing the same. The dirt is beginning to penetrate the house, turning the air musty and brown. Newt runs to Thomas’ side where he is bent over the window sill rubbing his eyes.

“He shouldn’t be out there,” Thomas gasps.

The rest of the group shouts over one another in frantic panic.

“He’s trying to secure the tarps!”

“The wind’s already too strong, he’ll never get it all it in time.”

“_Fuck_ – Winston!”

“He needs help,” Newt says.

“What?”

“He can’t do it on his own.”

Thomas gapes at Newt and shouts after him, flailing out to grab him and missing. Newt pushes right past where Harriet is holding Jeff back from doing the exact same thing Newt is about to. He runs out into the storm.

It is so much worse in the thick of it. Usually, at this point of the storm, when the winds have reached gale force level and the sand beating against your skin feels like a thousand tiny razors cutting into your skin everywhere, Newt would be either high or low and waiting to ride it out. There had been a time many years ago, when he had known Minho for only a few months, where they were hiding in an old building as the storm raged on outside. Newt had never seen a dust storm up close before that day, and he remembers how transfixed he had been. The air turned brown, and purple lightning ignited the sky in a deep, bloody red.

Newt watched a man on the beach cover himself in corrugated iron, the only protection he had against the storm. Newt couldn’t understand why he hadn’t run into a building, _any_ building, or called for help. He shouted at the man from the window, banging on it with some delusion of an idea that he could hear him. That was all he managed before Minho pinched the calf of his bad leg to get him down, swearing and yelling at him. When the storm passed, the iron remained but the man did not. 

It has taken him until now, six years later, to realise the man _couldn’t_ get up.

The winds threaten to pull his feet out from under him, the sand cutting like glass. He feels something catch on his cheek and slices it open, and Newt cries out and is almost knocked off his feet. From the porch, the faint muffled shouting of everyone in the house knocks him back to his senses. Newt shakes himself off and stands tall, squinting his eyes against the wind until he spots Winston skirting the edge of the tomato field, struggling with the trap. He already has the cabbages and potatoes secure. 

Newt runs and barely manages to stop short of slamming into Winston, the wind pushing him along less than helpfully.

“Newt!” Winston shouts. His face is coated in grime and his eyes barely stay open. “What are you doing out here?”

“Giving you a hand, you bloody psycho!” Newt shouts back, taking hold of the tarp. “Come on, hurry!”

In two minutes they have the entire crop field secure. Newt’s eyes burn with dust and tears. The feeling of hot blood dripping down the side of his face curls his insides and pulls at his bones and ligaments until they’re taught, and wants nothing but to run back to the house, stiff as a stringed puppet.

He is about to call out to the others when a loud snap cracks through the air like a whip, and one of the corners of the tarp Newt and Winston had just secured flies free.

“No!” Winston shouts and runs toward it.

Newt starts toward him. “Win –” he coughs, pulls the shirt tighter around his face, shielding his eyes with his arm, tries again, “Winston, come on!” 

Winston is pulling the tarp with all his might, fighting with nature with straining arms and determination in the grind of his teeth. “It needs to be covering them _all_,” Winston says. A gust of wind blows a hefty amount of dust in his face, and he coughs but does not let go of the tarp.

Winston says, “This is all of our food!”

“If the storm flies over us it won’t matter!”

“We have to try!” 

From the porch, Thomas screams, “_Watch out!_” just before a branch, large and with leaves hanging on by their fingernails, barrels through the air toward them.

Newt and Winston barely have enough time to fall to the ground before the tree branch soars over their heads, barely missing them. The impact, as well as the fall, causes a couple things to happen. The first is the impact of Newt’s body to the hard ground reverberates up his spine from his fingernails to the crown of his head, immediately winding him. The second is the way in which Newt’s ankle twisted as he threw himself down, and the sharp, shooting pain that runs up his leg now.

Newt spits dirt and grass from his mouth, head ducked against the wind and shoulders heaving with wild, gasping coughs. _It’s in his lungs, it’s in his lungs, it’s in his lungs._

The wind blears deafening in his ears, cutting off every other sense until all he knows and feels is the roar in his ears and the glass-like sand on his skin. Something cuts into his arm, forehead, and the back of his hand. Unbearable pain shoots up Newt’s leg when he tries to move, or rollover, or do anything. Suddenly, he feels hands on him, fisting into his jacket and pulling him off the ground.

Minho is holding Newt up and shouting at him, calling him a plethora of names that are all auspiciously muffled. Newt sees him through blurry tears whenever he fights the pain enough to open his eyes for as long as he can handle, as Minho half carries him to the house.

In the three seconds that his eyes are open, Newt spots Winston at the edge of the field, running into the storage unit around the side of the house. The door slams shut with a heavy, metal echo.

“Winston!” Minho calls, but it is cut off by a particularly heavy gust of wind which quite nearly succeeds in knocking both Newt and Minho over. They have no choice but to go inside without him.

Newt hears rather than sees Thomas struggling. He and Teresa are a blur of frantic, moving parts, as she fights him with all of her strength to keep him from running outside to help them. Jeff is shouting when they barrel through the front door. Thomas wastes no time in grabbing Newt and pulling him and Minho further into safety.

“Where –” Jeff’s neck cranes around the door frame. Harriet and Frypan hold him inside as Gally slams the door closed, finally cutting them off from the storm. Newt’s ears ring against the sudden, blaring silence.

“Wait!” Jeff cries, “Winston’s still out there! Where did he – I didn’t see –!”

“He ran into the shed,” Newt heaves. Thomas is tying a new mask around his face and Teresa is forcing him to drink water, tilting his head back and whispering softly. Newt pushes them both away and says, through coughs, “He ran into the shed, I saw him. It’s tough, he will be okay in there.”

Jeff looks ready to wrench the door open and run back out after him. Brenda most likely senses this, too, and says, “We don’t have time. We have to get down into the cellar, now!”

“We can’t just leave –”

“If anyone goes out there now they’ll be ripped to shreds.” Brenda’s expression is desperate, and terrified, “I’m sorry, Jeff, but we just have to trust that Winston will be safe in there, okay? Those things are strong, built specifically for storms like this.”

Thomas and Minho crowd Newt against the wall and lower him to the ground just as the sound of the basement door, cast iron, slams shut and locks, and everything in Newt simultaneously sighs in relief. The adrenaline melts away and is quickly replaced by searing pain. Newt sags against the wall, held up by Minho’s strong grip on his shoulders.

“Breathe,” Thomas is saying, “Breathe. You’re okay, now.”

Raking coughs continue to burst from Newt’s lungs, his eyes burning under the grain in the corners and under his lids. Hot tears continue to fall, and he feels someone press and wet cloth against the sting on his cheek.

“Newt,” this is Teresa now, “I’m going to pour water on your face, and then I need you to slowly blink open your eyes when I say to, okay? Ready?”

Newt goes through the arduous process of washing sand out of his eyes with Teresa’s soft voice guiding him, lifting his chin and turning his head this way and that, until the pain fades off to a dull irritation, and eventually Newt is able to keep his eyes open for longer than two seconds without them immediately welling up with tears.

Outside the storm rages. Inside everyone is quiet. Past Thomas and Minho’s heads, Newt sees Gally and Brenda passing around water to everyone in the room, back against the wall and breathing slowly through their masks, deep lungful’s of air. 

“Are you okay?” Minho is asking, as Thomas calls Gally over to them, “Are you hurt anywhere else? We all saw you fall, and it didn’t look pretty.”

And just like that, the adrenaline fizzles out like a wet coil of dynamite, and the pain returns worse than before. A sharp, teeth grinding and bone locking pain shoots up from Newt’s ankle, and he bites into the fabric tied around his face.

“Newt?”

“My ankle,” he groans through his teeth, “I must’ve twisted it.”

Gally says, “Uh … guys,” and everyone goes quiet, the only sound in the room is the radio, an on-the-hour radar informing them of the status of the storm. Right now, it is passing over Colorado and due to head eastward, the announcer tells them. 

“…_ 800-mile danger zone. Major areas have or are currently being evacuated. Those affected: seek high ground or refuge in a shelter. Avoid all doors and windows. If you are in a vehicle _…”

“Shit,” Thomas hisses, and a sharp pain like the edge of a rusty knife pierces Newt’s skin. He groans, loudly, and heads of a few members of the group turn in confused alarm. “Shh, I’m sorry,” Thomas says.

“What’s wrong with him?” Frypan asks, from the other end of the room. He has one hand on Jeff’s shoulder, as the other washes grime and dirt off his face with a damp towel. Through blurry vision Newt sees Thomas and Minho wince. His ankle burns.

The radio chatters, “_Please seek shelter immediately. If you have access to water and resources _…”

In the end it is Teresa who cups his face in her hands, and says, “You’re going to be okay, Newt, but this is going to hurt,” and punctually slots his ankle back into place.

Newt jerks forward, a sharp cry forcefully ripping itself from his throat. Outside, wind and thunder rages like the gates of hell themselves have opened up, but it still hadn’t been loud enough the smother the sickening pop of his bones realigning. Newt’s head swims and he simply breathes and waits for his vision to fade back from black, to white, to clear. Teresa’s apologetic expression and Gally’s pale face are framed by Thomas and Minho who, Newt thinks, are doing a pretty decent job at putting on brave faces. 

The world sways. Outside, the earth splits in two. Thunder rages across the sky in angry bursts of blue and purple hues, the trees sway and the waves crash against the shore. The man is ducking under the iron except that, too, is blown away. Newt watches as sand eats away at his flesh and devours his bones until the only thing left of him is his pained, blood-curling screams.

Minho is pulling him to the ground by his hair, and Newt wakes up. 

The basement is quiet.

A static melody sings quietly in the corner of the dark, dry room. A voice accompanies it, sweet and clear, singing in perfect harmony with the one over the radio, and it takes Newt a long moment to realise it is Sonya.

He also realises he is far more horizontal than he thought he originally thought, and when Newt attempts to lift his head it instantly swims, a dull, throbbing pain circling in deep, thumbing motions in the back of his skull. The thing he is resting on – which turns out to be Thomas – instantly starts at the movement, and pushes Newt’s shoulders down until he is back where he started.

“Hey, easy there,” Thomas’ low, husky voice murmurs to him, “Don’t try and get up.”

Newt tries to rub at his eyes, which no longer burn but itch like crazy, but Thomas bats his hands away. “What happened?” Newt groans.

“You passed out,” Thomas says, brushing some hair off Newt’s forehead, “Slept through most of the storm, actually.”

Newt slowly turns his head and peers out at the rest of the room. Teresa and Minho are huddled under a blanket close by, watching Newt with wide, concerned eyes, and the rest scatter around the room in twos and threes. Sonya is still singing (_throw your loving arms around me__, I am weary let me rest_), and Jeff sits with his back against the door, watching the opposite wall with glassy, far away eyes.

“Is it over?” Newt asks.

Thomas bites his lip. “Not yet,” he says, “But almost. The worst of it has passed. Lucky you were out, it got so loud at one point it felt like we were about to be taken to Oz.”

Thomas laughs at his own joke. Newt loves him a lot.

“Thirsty?”

Newt nods, and Thomas helps him sit up. Teresa slides the water over with the top of her foot. Sonya stops singing for half a moment at the sound of movement, and the others glance over in various degrees of impartial. Most of them look pleased enough that he is awake. Sonya offers Newt a twitchy smile before she carries on where she left off. Newt smiles twitchily back.

“They switched over to music about an hour ago when the transmission cut out,” Thomas says, and Newt almost chokes on the water.

“How long have we been down here?”

Thomas’ head lolls against the wall tiredly. “It’s coming up to seven hours,” he says.

“_Seven hours?”_ Newt breathes.

Thomas’ shoulders hunch as he reaches to his left. “You should eat something,” he says when he comes back, holding a small packet of crackers.

“Tommy,” Newt whispers, and Thomas’ eyes flash in a warning. They say, _Don’t_.

Thomas pushes the open crackers into Newt’s hand. He takes them, slowly, and eats the crackers at an even more languid pace. No one speaks. Sonya has stopped singing. The radio fizzes in and out. Above them, the wind begins to stutter, coming in sudden bursts before it eventually stops altogether, and at the first sound of pure, ear-ringing silence, everyone stops breathing. The air is still and musky, thick with the faint taste of sulphur when you breathe. 

Jeff whispers, “Finally,” and rises to his feet. As soon as his hand touches the first lock on the door Gally shouts and Frypan jumps up from the ground.

“Wait!” Gally cries, “The air’s still toxic!”

“Don’t care,” Jeff spits through clenched teeth, struggling to pull his hands free of Fry’s grasp.

“Hey,” Fry murmurs, pulling Jeff against him, “Hey, stop. You go up there now and you won’t be able to breathe. We need to wait a bit longer.”

Jeff forcefully pulls himself out of his friend’s embrace, beginning to pace before the door, face twisted in anger and fear, “I’m sick of waiting. It’s been hours. Winston is up there on his own.”

Fry eventually persuades Jeff to calm down, and they stand by the wall furthest from Newt, talking in hushed whispers. Occasionally one of their voices will spark (Jeff) and the other will shush them down (Fry) and Jeff will glance over at Newt out of the corner of his eye. Newt looks away. Minho and Teresa scuttle over to Newt and Thomas, and Minho leans against Newt’s shoulder, a comforting warmth against his side, busying himself with untying and retying his laces.

Thomas, who had previously been struggling to keep his head upright, falls asleep on Newt’s shoulder, and Teresa curls up with her head on his thigh as a pillow. Together they resemble a marble statue; a renaissance painting; a charcoal sketch, cut together like two pieces of a jig-saw puzzle that have escaped the rest of the set. They look just as they did the first-day Newt laid eyes on them.

They allow another thirty-five minutes for the dust to settle and the oxygen to get it’s shit together. Jeff is pushing the door open with all his might as soon as every latch is unlocked, and bounding up the stairs two at a time. Frypan and Harriet race after him and call out his name, their voices bouncing through the hollow walls of the stairwell. Newt stands and attempts to follow at equal the amount of speed, but one step and he is reminded of the pain from before (_hours_ before, it feels like only minutes) as that same pain, phantom or otherwise, shoots back up his leg like hot metal pikes.

Thomas and Minho catch him when he wobbles on his feet.

Outside, the air feels a little a washing machine that has been left open to let out any remaining condensation, but with an undercoat of a dry, sandy feel that gives give an illustrious, dream-like taste to reality. Inside the house is thick and hot, and dust particles shimmer in the air and float about in empty space as if this is their home, and Newt and the others are just visiting. They’re going to have to keep all the door and windows open for a week to air all this out.

Outside does not fare much better.

Newt grips the wooden railing of the front porch and peers out over the land. The crops have, somehow, made it through, and the relief at the sight of them is so palpable it almost makes Newt dizzy. Except …

“Where is he?” Jeff is saying, voice overcast in terror and disbelief that turns Newt’s blood cold in and instant. He climbs down the stairs with Thomas’ hand in his and Minho at their backs, on hand on each of their shoulders. Thomas instantly coughs when they reach the bottom, as soon as he takes the first, unresigned lungful of air.

Finally, they turn the corner where the storage shed comes into full view, only to find the doors wide open, swinging back and forth on creaky hinges.

“Oh fuck,” Minho breathes.

They all stare at it, dumbfounded. Brenda and Sonya immediately set to work on searching their nearest surroundings and shouting Winston’s name into the too-quiet valley, while Teresa, Gally, and Harriet work on clearing the rubble leftover by trees and shrubs, shouting for him as well. The cornfield, as the only thing they could not cover, has been torn to shreds. The scarecrow hangs in the old fig tree, grotesquely bent in half, and for a heart-stopping moment Newt thinks it is Winston.

“I don’t get it,” Fry says, holding on to one of the swinging doors and staring at it as if it could give him the answers, “It should have held.”

They call his name again.

“Well,” Jeff starts, “he has to be around here somewhere. He probably found another hiding spot. We just have to –”

And then Sonya screams, and it is all over.

Newt hits the ground for the second time today, but now it is with Jeff above him, grasping the collar of his shirt in a choking grip and forcing his shoulders into the dirt. Minho and Thomas are on him in an instant with Frypan between them, pulling him away from Newt as everyone flutters around nervously, shouting all at one with increasing volume. Newt coughs and rolls onto his elbows, wiping spit off his cheek, and above him Jeff is shouting, “_Liar!”_

“Jeff!”

“You said he went inside!”

“He did!” This is Minho, after Thomas has helped Newt back up, slotting himself between Newt and Jeff who is threatening to break free from Fry’s grasp. Gally holds his other shoulder and Harriet pushes on the centre of Jeff’s chest, trying to talk him down. He does not listen.

“I saw him run into the shed, Jeff,” Newt says, “We _both_ did.” Minho nods, “Okay? Believe me, we’re confused, too.”

“It should have held,” Frypan is whispering to himself, shaking his head, a deep crease between his eyebrows.

“Well it didn’t,” Jeff spits, ripping himself from everyone’s hold. Everyone tenses for a moment when they think he is going to start towards Newt again, but instead Jeff turns and begins to march in the direction of the old fig tree, shoulders hunched and head hung low.

“Jeff –” Brenda calls.

“Just leave me alone. Please,” is Jeff’s only response. It is as if as soon as he walks away, dragging his feet and occasionally stalling and tripping on stray rocks and branches, it all becomes real, and a cold wave of pressure settles down upon all of them.

Jeff comes back inside much later. Without Fry’s insistence and gentle persuasions, he might have stayed out under the tree all night.

They bury Winston’s body in the morning, in the small fenced-off patch beside an old swing set that may or may not have been there before the storm, beside his parents. Each of them takes turns saying a few short words and laying leaves from the disemboweled cornfield on the mound of dirt, for lack of anything nicer.

The picturesque sight of it all makes Newt sick; the grey sky overhead, the ruined field before them, the sad clutter of leaves on top of Winston’s grave beside the two that have laid there for years. Winston’s parents’ graves have wooded headstones with their names clearly labelled, but all they could give their friend was a W spelled out in stones. Jeff doesn’t say a word the whole ceremony, and neither does he for the remainder of the day, and well into the night.

Newt throws up into the toilet. In a dramatic turn on events, Thomas is at his back, talking him through it. He tastes sand on the back of his tongue.

Frypan cooks plates of vegetables for dinner; potatoes and carrots from their salvaged food supply, but it seems as if no one is hungry, staring down at their plates with faraway eyes and hunched shoulders. Newt leans on his palm, idly flicking a potato around with his fork.

Thomas is brushing his teeth when Newt is fixing the blankets on the couch, ready for bed. In the darkness a voice behind him says, “You know,” and Newt is startled to find Jeff standing at the entrance to the living room. He is half cloaked in shadows where the other half of his body bathes in the dim yellow light of the kitchen. He appears vaguely spectral, shifting between stages of reality, swaying and catching himself against the archway.

Jeff continues, as Newt holds his breath, “I want to blame you, just for something to …” he stops, closing his eyes. After a moment he begins again, “But he wouldn’t want me to. So I won’t.” 

Jeff turns and leaves, walking up the stairs before Newt can say anything. His heavy footsteps on the landing echo in Newt’s dreams that night.

When he wakes the next morning it is to empty arms and blankets tangled around his feet, and an instant feeling of _wrongness_ settled in his bones.

Thomas is at the entrance of the kitchen with everyone else, gathered around the small round table. At first he just sees the back of him; tense muscles, apprehension gliding off the slope of his shoulders. When he turns to Newt his face is a strange brand of melancholic calm, fiddling with his inhaler.

Newt asks, “What is it?” and it is Harriet who answers, from the table.

“It’s Jeff,” she says, and when Newt comes closer, she slides a creased piece of paper towards him, “He’s gone.”

The paper, in Jeff’s rough, scrawled handwriting, reads, _Don’t look for me._

Just like that, the headcount drops to nine. 

The moment of clarity does not come that same day, when Jeff left, nor the day after. It is a stunning three days later, when Newt is limping around the crops with a watering can, that he sees it: one of the corners of the tarp is not tied to the pikes like the others, plastic woven around the metal ring at the very top, but rather engulfs the pike itself. It has been done in a desperate hurry, panic sewn into the tight, impossibly small knot at the centre.

This is the exact spot where they discovered Winston’s body.

Newt’s knees grow weak and his ankle gives out, and he falls into the dirt with a cloud of dust.

The door _had_ held. The storm didn’t rip it open and kill Winston but, rather, he _chose_ to leave to secure the last pike.

He saved them all from starving.

One month later Thomas, after an intense fit during which he’d manage to draw a fever for himself, is put on strict bed rest. While he is upstairs feeling awful and feeling fidgety, Newt is limping around the crop field with Minho by his side, not quite touching but hands remotely outstretched so that if Newt were to trip at any moment he would be able to catch him.

His leg has not been the same since that day. The fall, and whether it be the dislocation of the sickening pop he’d heard along with it, had undone everything WCKD did to mend his leg.

“Fuck,” Newt curses with feeling, putting pressure on the tip of his foot and flinching away at the intense electricity follows it all the way up his leg. 

“Still the same?” Minho asks even though Newt knows he is aware of the answer. Newt sighs and together they sit at the edge of the torn-up cornfield, the long, dead leaves crunching miserably under them.

After a long moment of gazing at the hazy sky and low hanging clouds in the distance, Newt says, “It’s fine.”

When Minho glances at him, curiously, out of the corner of his eye, Newt continues, “I guess I’ll just have to get used to it again. Walking with this thing,” at _thing_ he smacks his knee with the back of his hand. 

Minho nods. “You did it once,” he says, “You’ll definitely be able to do it again. And, besides, you don’t know if this is permanent. Could just be sprained, you know. In a few weeks you might be back to normal.”

Newt knows deep down that this is false. His leg feels the way it did before he arrived at The Program, before he woke up that strange morning to Janson holding his ankle in a tight grip and analysing it like a math problem. The swelling will go down eventually, yes, but as for the bone itself …

“You’re right,” Newt tells Minho, rather than voice his thoughts. Something in Minho’s expression, however, alludes that he already knows. “Just have to wait.”

Minho touches Newt’s shoulder and pulls his knees in to stand, “Come on, buddy, let’s get you back inside. Harriet said ice is good for –”

“Wait,” Newt says, and Minho stops, “Can we just stay out here a bit longer? I can’t – I like the fresh air.” 

Minho relaxes back into his previous state, and Newt takes a gulp of air. It no longer tastes like burnt sulphur and does not feel like fire in Newt’s throat. It would probably be good for Thomas, Newt thinks, offhand, and makes a note to bring him out here later if his fever has gone down. It doesn’t suit him to be up in that room, blankets around his knees, and bored and restless. For as long as Newt has known Thomas he has always been moving; talking with his hands, pacing about the room, tapping his fingers on the couch while everyone chatted wildly around them, or running. Thomas is an embodiment of energy bound to a physique which requires too much rest and recharge. It hurts to see him stuck in bed as much as it hurts Thomas himself.

The sun has slipped timidly behind the clouds when Minho says, “I’ve missed you, Newt.”

Newt stares at him, shocked. “What?”

Minho waves a hand at him, “Don’t get your panties in a twist. I just mean we haven’t spent a lot of time together in a while. Not like we used to. I just … I miss you.”

Newt’s mouth dries out, and he swallows against it. After a moment, all he can manage is, “I’m sorry.”

Minho shakes his head, and offers a smile which looks far too polite for Newt’s liking, and completely juxtaposes his words, “Look, I get it. Young love and all that carp.” Minho pauses. “So. Thomas?”

Newt blurts out, “I love him,” in a breath and Minho’s expression, finally, thankfully, relaxes into something more familiar and easier.

“Okay. Does he know that?”

Newt swallows again, “He does.”

Minho asks, “When?” and Newt’s mind spirals: _The pool, at the house in Vegas. When he was driving, red-cheeked and messy-haired, eyes wild and lips stretched into an impossibly big smile. In the auditorium. In his room back at the Project, when it felt as if they were dancing to the song on the radio. When he spent weeks worrying for him alongside Teresa. When they were in line, and he saw him for the first time, and couldn’t take his eyes off him. _

Newt realises then, pulling out of his thoughts feeling remotely winded, that Minho is asking about when he told Thomas he loved him.

“Two months ago, I think,” Newt says, and hopes Minho can’t hear his pounding heartbeat in the shake of his voice.

Minho smiles again, and says, “Good. I don’t think I need to ask what he said back. That guy’s about as subtle as a fucking matchbox. It was torture, watching you two dance around each other like a couple of headless gazelles. Those, Newt,” he sticks his finger in Newt’s face, “are months I’ll never get back.”

“Months?” Newt frowns, “We thought he was dating Teresa, then.”

Minho rolls his eyes, and sighs, deeply and to the sky, “No, dipshit. _You_ thought he was with Teresa. Of course, they weren’t dating. Anyone could see that.”

Newt suddenly feels deeply and profoundly offended, on his own behalf.

“In all honesty,” Minho says, “I went and told Teresa what you thought, that night. About her and Thomas. Don’t think I’ve seen someone laugh that hard in my life. Juice came out of her nose. It was kinda hot, really.”

“Minho.” Newt fights the urge to punch him. “How could you not tell me?”

“Are you kidding? It was _hilarious_. We all had bets on when and how it’ll happen, and who would make the first move. Which, by the way,” Minho grins at him, slyly, “We never settled. So, who was it?”

“Fuck you,” Newt says.

Minho shrugs, “Fair enough.”

Newt drops his head onto his knee, and Minho laughs at his side while shaking Newt’s shoulder.

He feels at peace when they walk back to the house. He’d missed Minho as well, and it had only taken him this long to realise it. They had spent years together on the street, knowing and trusting only each other. They were each other’s safety blankets for so long before WCKD, and before they let others into their lives and their circle.

Newt worries if Minho felt at all jealous of Thomas in the beginning, and hates himself for not knowing the answer. If his best friend was feeling neglected or left out for any reason at all, Newt should have clued into it. It shouldn’t have taken them this long – six go damn months – to finally have a conversation that should have happened months ago before Minho had time to get used to it and move on.

“I’m sorry,” Newt says, again, “I’ve missed you, too.”

Minho knocks his shoulder against Newt’s, lightly, “Don’t worry about it, okay? Hey,” he says, “Come with me to town tomorrow. Gotta pick up some stuff for Fry, and Harriet wants a few bandages or cream, or whatever the hell she was going on about. Don’t think Gally will mind too much.”

Newt smiles, and bumps his shoulder back. “Can’t wait.”

Gally doesn’t look particularly pleased about being replaced but refrains from saying anything about it, and Newt and Minho traverse into town together for the first time. They apparently never go all the way into The Last City but skirt around the neighbouring towns. Newt feels on edge the entire ride there, the high, glossy towers glimmer at them from a distance, and the impervious border stands tall and strong around it. Newt used to imagine it to have a moat and a dragon guarding the entrance like in the fairy tales his mother used to read him, when she used to read to him, stopping anyone who isn’t shiny and clean from entering. 

The feeling of anxiety bubbling in his stomach lessens once they stop outside a small market in a sleepy town named Haven, and ceases all together once Minho begins flirting with the pretty girl manning the apple and oranges, expertly distracting her while Newt knocks a few into his bag.

He knows he should feel bad – _they_ should feel bad, stealing from these people – especially at the sight of the girl’s happy smile and wave as they leave, but he does not. Something inside Newt could not care less.

Next, Minho puts the moves on the boy over by the confectionery goods, and then the girl over by the vegetables, and lastly, daringly, the man with the pharmaceuticals. He stands and cocks his hip and grins and narrows his eyes seductively at each and every one of them while Newt rolls his eyes at his back and does all the dirty work. He wonders if this is what Gally has to deal with every time they go out for supply runs together, and if so, it’s no wonder that he returns grumpier than when he’d left. 

Newt throws blackberries into Minho’s mouth as he drives them back to the farm. Thomas looks significantly better when they return – which Newt is skeptical about – and he and Newt acquire one of the bedrooms that night as everyone else is fearful of catching germs. 

Somehow, after dressing into their nightclothes and rolling the sheet back in preparation for bed, they begin kissing, and Thomas is still trying to convince him he really does feel better around the same time he begins to wriggle under Newt’s hips with purpose.

Newt laughs softly against his mouth, pulling away and gazing down at Thomas with amusement most definitely painted all over his face. It makes Thomas frown, and immediately try and pull him back.

“Tommy,” Newt whispers, lips brushing wetly against Thomas’, “No.”

Thomas makes an annoyed sound, and wriggles some more, “I feel better.”

“Thomas.”

“Everyone’s downstairs,” Thomas tries, which seems to be his go-to in convincing Newt that sex right that very second is a good idea; that their friends are elsewhere. It’s. Well. It has room for improvement, but who is Newt to deny its success in the past.

“They’ll be up soon,” Newt also tries, albeit weaker, as Thomas has begun to mouth at his jaw and is currently nipping at a particularly sensitive spot behind his ear, the absolute asshole. 

“Not soon enough,” Thomas says, “I want you inside me.”

Newt’s mouth goes dry and he groans – honestly, just. Fuck him, how _dare_ he – and kisses Thomas hard, eliciting a happy little moan from him that sounds far too smug, which is, of course, the moment someone knocks on the door.

They break apart as fast as lightning, Newt feeling out of breath and dizzy and Thomas looking not too far off, as they listen to Frypan’s soft and unsure voice on the other side of the door, “Hey, guys. I, uh. I forgot my toothbrush in there, so …”

After a couple of deep breaths, Newt forces himself to pull away and miserably walk toward the door, not opening it before Thomas has had time to tug the blankets over himself, all the way up to his chin.

Which isn’t suspicious at all.

Newt rolls his eyes and turns the knob, and allows Fry to enter. He doesn’t quite look either of them in the eye, which is fantastic, and practically runs in and out, which is _spectacular. _

Thomas breathes a deep sigh of relief as soon as the door is closed and re-locked, as if he had been holding it the entire time Fry was in the room (which wasn’t for long, but Thomas shouldn’t be holding his breath for any matter of reason, and so Newt needs to remember to be mad at him tomorrow. When he’s less hard.)

“That was close,” Thomas says, pushing the blankets off of him again, revealing the long lines of his body, and where his clothing is sticking to his skin.

“Yeah,” Newt says, eyes roving downwards, and watches from a sort of far off place as all his inhibitions take a temporary vacation. “It was,” he adds, and smiles as he crawls back in between Thomas’ legs and into his waiting arms. 

Two weeks pass with relative indifference. A dust storm strikes four days after Newt and Minho’s shopping trip into town. It is in no way as strong and threatening as the storm that devastated their group all those weeks ago, but it forces them back down into the basement nonetheless. Most of the crops survive, yet again, except one end of the tarp by the tomatoes and potatoes breaks loose, and they, unfortunately lose half the supply. The crops grow at a much slower rate after that, which means more frequent supply runs, and more chances of their faces being recognised.

Newt, Thomas, Minho, Teresa, and Brenda are planting more seeds from their measly backup supply down in the basement when Gally and Sonya return, both jumping out of the car in tandem with matching bleak expressions on their faces.

“Hey,” Minho calls over to them from the zucchinis, balancing an elbow on his garden hoe, “What’s with the long faces?”

Brenda and Teresa exchange a worried look before Brenda asks, “Is everything okay?”

“Fine,” Gally replies, gruffly, practically ripping a box of whatever out of the back of the car, and walking with them back into the house without another word.

Sonya isn’t much more help, offering a stiff grin and a quieter, “Yeah. Fine.”

Minho frowns after Gally and drops the hoe to chase him down. Newt watches him go with a churning feeling in his stomach. Sonya follows them both, long thin braid swaying in the wind as she walks. It is clear to Newt that Thomas, Teresa, and Brenda also feel something is off but they, like Newt, swallow the anxiety and get back to work.

It can wait until later.

8PM rolls by, officially later, and still no one is talking. Gally, shoulders stiff and head ducked, is gripping his spoon so hard it might snap in two, and Sonya is staring at her bowl of soup as if she is trying to communicate with it telepathically.

The group allows the game of chicken to carry on for far too much longer, until Harriet eventually breaks and says, “Okay, seriously. What is going on?”

Sonya snaps out of her daze with a start, and Harriet places a hand between her shoulder blades, comfortingly. Sonya’s eyebrows are pinched together with anxiety, and her bottom lip worries beneath her teeth.

Gally, sighing, looks at her and says, “Are you going to tell them, or should I?”

Everyone holds their breath, and when Sonya says nothing, Gally announces, “Someone recognised blondie at the markets today.”

Sonya says, “I told you I shouldn’t have gone,” when everyone immediately tries to talk at once.

Gally slams his fist on the table. The cutlery chimes, loud. “So this is my fault?”

“I didn’t say that!” Sonya glares at him.

Gally glares back, “What you _said_ is you didn’t feel like going. Not that you could be recognised!” 

“Guys!” Harriet shouts, trying to break it up before something could really start, “That doesn’t matter right now.”

“She’s right,” Newt says, and then to Sonya, “Who was it?”

Sonya shrugs, scratching under her eye, “An old client.”

“Shit,” Minho whispers, dropping back into his seat, “Are you kidding me right now?”

“Are they …” Teresa begins, and Newt can see her mind reeling for the best way to approach this subject, “Could they be dangerous?”

Sonya snorts, “Not likely.”

Fry says, “Guys, that’s not –”

Thomas cuts him off, “No, Teresa has a point. Is there any chance they followed you?”

Gally shakes his head. “We lost the bastard back at the markets.”

Thomas tries again, “But could he have followed you?”

“I said no. Look, we were keeping a lookout the entire drive back here. There was absolutely no one following us.”

Sonya groans and drops her head into her hands, hair falling over her shoulder like a satin curtain, “This is all my fault.”

Harriet moves her hair back and whispers, “No, it isn’t. No one could have known that was going to happen.”

Gally huffs, and Thomas turns to him and says, “Do you have something to say, Gally?”

Nine pairs of eyes instantly turn to him, and then to Thomas, and then back to Gally with a variety of different expressions and concerns swimming among them. Gally’s shoulders remain stiff and his expression wavers through various degrees of angry, to mean, to cold before he settles on a combination of the first and last, and stands.

“Not at all,” he says, and leaves the room. No one goes after him this time. 

The knock on the door comes on a gloomy Thursday night, rain spattering gently on the windows as dark clouds and sounds of thunder grow in the distance. Harriet is in the kitchen with Sonya, feeding her strawberries. Teresa and Minho and Brenda gather around the table, laughing, and Frypan and Gally are out the back. Thomas is leaning back against Newt’s chest where they lounge on the couch, his arms around Thomas’ shoulders while he traces patterns and invisible pictures into the fabric of Newt’s jeans when it happens.

Everyone stills. No one moves or speaks until a moment passes. When the knock does not repeat, Brenda rises from the table with a sigh, muttering, “Idiots probably locked themselves outside, again.”

She is three feet away from the door when the knock returns, this time louder like someone is pounding their fist against the wood. Newt’s blood goes cold and he tightens his arms around Thomas, who is sitting up. Whoever is on the other side of their door, it definitely isn’t Gally and Fry. 

From the kitchen, Teresa whispers, “Brenda?” right before a gunshot rings out and the door bursts open. Brenda jumps back with a sharp cry, layers of wood exploding from the door jam and propelling towards her. Newt, the closest, launches himself off the couch and pulls her into the living room, out of the hallway and away from the door.

“Brenda!” Minho shouts, and Newt can see him being held back from running into the hallway by Teresa. Newt quickly scans his line of sight for any more of their friends, but he cannot see Harriet or Sonya. Gally and Fry are outside but must have heard the sound of the gunshot.

Thomas appears on the other side of Brenda and pushes them both behind him.

“I’m okay,” Brenda calls back, eyes wide and shaking. “Shit! What –”

Then, by the back door, Newt hears Fry’s voice call out, “What the hell was –” and Gally’s, “Look out!” right before another gunshot bursts through the house, and a mirror at the end of the hall shatters. Everyone drops to the floor, running behind the couch. Teresa and Minho duck under the table, and her grip on his shirt looks almost choking.

An unknown voice calls out, “Hello?” before heavy footsteps bound slowly through the entrance of the house and three men appear. Dread fills Newt to his core.

“I know you’re in here,” one of them says, the shorter one in the back, “Could see you through the window.”

“Come on out,” The middle man says, who appears younger than the other two.

“_Shit shit shit_,” Brenda hisses, from where they crouch in the shadows, “Fuck, they all have guns.”

“Look at the serial number,” Thomas whispers by Newt’s ear, “Those guns are from Wicked.”

From the hallway, the first man, who walks taller and with more purpose than the other two, says, “I’m only going to ask nicely one more time, darlin’.”

“No,” Newt shakes his head, “No they’re not WCKD.”

Newt begins to scope the room. If the three men stay in the same place that they are now, Newt, Thomas and Brenda could theoretically sneak behind the stairs and out the back door without them noticing. It would be hard, bordering on almost impossible, but it could happen if they move quick enough. Then there is the matter of disarming them. They’ll have to sneak up from behind, and one person would possibly have to distract while the others pounce.

Newt has only held a gun a handful of times in his life, and fired one once, during his father’s measly attempt to teach him how to use one before concluding that no, Newt’s skinny and underfed little arms couldn’t support the weight of a basic handgun, let alone pull the trigger, and gave up.

The men continue to move further into the house, whistling and calling out for someone to answer them. Newt settles into his crouch and plants his feet. They have to move fast, and now. They have to –

“Hey,” the shorter man says, “Boss, take a look at this. I think I found a couple over here.”

“No,” Thomas gasps and, for one terrifying second goes to stand before Brenda grabs his arm and pulls him back to the ground. The act, however, causes a faint thump which catches the attention of the man in the back.

“Shit, how many of you are there?” he says, and begins to approach the living room, “This might be a lot more exciting than I thought.”

Quite a few things happen, then. The first is a crash from the kitchen, Harriet’s distinct voice crying, “No!” before Sonya appears in the hallway yelling, “Stop!” moments before yet another gunshot rings out. This one catches the stair rail. Sonya screams and ducks behind a wall, and one of the men shouts as well, turning on the one who shot the gun and jerking the long barrel of it to point at his shoe.

“You idiot!” he screams, “Don’t fire – that’s her!” Then, he takes a deep breath and spins back around, saying, “Elizabeth,” in a slow, honey-like drawl which instantly makes Newt’s stomach sick, “Come on out. I apologise for this buffoon, here, he’s new. Apparently, we’re scraping the bottom of the barrel, these days. Ah – there you are.”

Newt watches, horrified, as Sonya puts herself into full view of the men. The first man opens his arms toward her as if offering an embrace, and Sonya takes a step back. “Elizabeth,” he says, “Aren’t you a sight for sore eyes.”

Sonya’s face is stony. “That isn’t my name anymore.”

“Sweetheart, I couldn’t care less.”

“How did you find me?” Sonya says, breath coming in quick bursts now, “I took the tracker out! You couldn’t have –”

The leader steps forward, and Sonya takes another step back. He doesn’t seem particularly phased by this/ “I’m assuming you mean the tracker in your arm. Yeah, well, you forgot about the smaller one in your leg. Newer tech, that, much more accurate, but it still has its cons.

“You see,” The man steps forward again. Newt leans around the side of the couch to see the shorter of the bunch pointing his gun at Minho and Teresa, where they have been forced into a huddle against the wall. 

“These trackers only work within a certain mile radius. When you ditched and drove to Nevada that day – which I’m still upset about, Elizabeth, but we’ll work on forgiveness later – the little red dot around your name fizzed out. Until,” he smiles, slow and chilling, and Sonya is staring between him and her leg in complete bewilderment, “the other day, that is. Imagine our surprise.”

“You –” Sonya voice wavers, “You put one in my _leg?_”

“What?” The man says, incredulously, “Did you think we weren’t going to want to be more careful with our star girl? Sweetheart, we put that in you the second you started pulling fourteen clients per week.”

“No,” Sonya whispers, shaking her head. Her back is against the wall, now, “No.”

“Look,” the man says, again, “It is what it is, okay? Done and dusted. We’re on a tight schedule and I’d like to be out of this shit pit sooner rather than later so Nicolas, please, if you would be so kind.”

The sound of the gun shifting out of stun rings by Newt’s ear a moment before he fees the cold barrel of it press against his temple. Newt lifts his eyes slowly to find the younger of the three men peering down at them over the back of the couch.

“Stand up,” he says. His voice is surprisingly quieter and less gruff than the other two, and at that moment Newt thinks, _We can take you_. “Now. Hurry up.”

Together with their palms raised, Newt, Thomas, and Brenda rise up from the floor. Nicolas points the gun a little too close to Brenda and she pushes it away with the back of her hand, glaring, “We’re _up_, asshole, okay?”

From the hallway, Sonya gasps, “Nick?”

Nicolas looks at her and his face grows pale, only wavering a moment before it smooths back into something blank and lifeless, mimicking the others. Sonya’s story comes back to Newt, then, more specifically her words, _There was a guy there who had a crush on me. _

“I’m sorry,” Nick says.

“Fuck you,” Sonya responds.

“Okay!” The first man shouts, “Let’s wrap this up, preferably before I’m dead. Where’re the other two?” No one answers. “No? Whatever. Come on, Ellie, time to go.”

He starts towards Sonya, but before he can reach her Harriet jumps out of the shadows and pushes herself between Sonya and the man. “Don’t you fucking touch her!” she practically growls.

The leader stares at them, beyond bemused, “Who the hell is this? No, it doesn’t matter. Come on, sweetheart, before I really have to hurt someone.”

Harriet shields Sonya with her entire body, her eyes dark and teeth bared in furious animosity. She looks like a lioness ready to pounce. “You are not taking her anywhere.”

The leader gives Harriet a slow, contemplative look before subtly cocking his chin to the man with Teresa and Minho, and saying, “Craig, in ten seconds shoot that one – the boy, not the girl, you baboon. She’s pretty, was thinking she might like to come with us.”

“Like hell,” Thomas growls and tries to launch himself at the leader, only to be held back by Newt and Brenda, and Nicolas and his gun.

“Oh! You wanna join the party now, too?” He looks at Thomas in a certain way which makes Newt want to see his face fall into one of the garden hoes, “Yeah, alright, fine, you can come along, pretty boy. Desert dweller, right? Yeah, we got a few of those. You all have this –” he waves his hand flouncily “– look about you.” 

“Marcus!” Sonya cries and pushes herself out from behind Harriet, who gapes at her in shock. Sonya gives her one sad look before turning back to the leader. “Just stop, please. Leave everyone else alone and I’ll … I’ll go with you.” 

“Excellent,” Marcus claps, “That’s my girl. Hurry on, now.”

Harriet grips her shoulders tight and spins Sonya around to look at her. Between them passes a length of time, not particularly long in reality, but may just as well be an eternity to them, unspoken and quiet. Harriet’s hands move to cup Sonya’s jaw, and when Sonya’s shoulders begin to shake Newt feels his heart break in pieces.

Marcus spits on the floor and groans, “Come _on_.”

Craig cocks his gun at Minho, causing him and Teresa to jump, and suddenly Gally appears behind Nick and hits him in the back of the head with a broom handle.

Hell, or close to it, cordially breaks loose. Minho, using the current heaven-sent distraction to surge forward and punch Craig in the face, knocking him to the floor, Teresa stomping on his chest once he is down. Frypan runs at Marcus with a shout and grabs a hold of his gun, slamming him into the wall. Minho successfully rips the gun out of Craig’s hands and Brenda surges forward and snatches Nick’s gun, where he is now face down and groaning into the floor. Brenda points her newly acquired weapon at Marcus while Minho points his at Craig.

“Drop it!” Brenda says, cocking her gun in a warning. Marcus laughs and struggles against Frypan a moment longer before Brenda surges forward and presses the barrel against his forehead. “I said drop it!”

“Okay, okay,” Marcus sighs, releasing his grip of the gun one finger at a time, smiling cheerily at Frypan the whole time. He stops smiling when Frypan hits him in the head with the backend of it, sending him sprawling to the floor with a flat and delayed, “Ow.”

“Alright,” Brenda says. Having Marcus handled, Fry walks over and hands the gun over to Thomas as his request, who points it down at Nick, who has now crawled into a kneeling position. “Here’s what’s going to happen. You are going to take yourself and your ratty-ass buddies far away from here, or I am going to kill you.”

Marcus blinks up at her and, after a moment of tense silence, laughs. It’s high and wheezy, and easily the most teeth curling sound Newt has ever heard in his life.

“You’re not going to –”

Brenda hits him as Fry had, and after a sharp crunch which propels his head back into the floor with another unpleasant noise, she shouts at the top of her lungs, “_Right now!_”

The room falls silent. Even Craig stops struggling and wailing pathetically for a moment, as everyone stares at Brenda with astonishment.

“You never come back here, do you understand me? Because you know what, _Marcus_,” Brenda spits his name like it is acid on her tongue, “We know all about your business. How do you think WCKD will take it if they knew that inside their precious, squeaky clean city there was a trade offering a certain service from minors.”

Brenda’s voice is low, and cold and dangerous, and something like fear briefly passes over Marcus’ face. “That will end you, won’t it?” Brenda whispers.

“Give me that,” Newt says, tapping Thomas’ wrist, who blinks at him, “Go to Teresa and Minho. I can handle this one.”

Thomas, hesitantly, passes the gun over to Newt. After a quick but lingering brush of his fingers against the back of Newt’s neck, he rushes across the hall to their friends.

“I’m sorry,” Nick whispers up to Newt, and when Newt looks down at him he sees how young he really is; not much older than Newt, a handsome face with a shock of dark hair and eyes. They are surprisingly they are clear and earnest. “Really. I didn’t want this. They forced me to track her down. I wouldn’t have –”

Newt presses the gun against Nick’s cheekbone, and he recoils. “Shut up,” Newt says, “It isn’t me you should be apologising to, mate. Which you’ll be doing soon, don’t worry about that.”

Newt watches Thomas’ short journey across the house until he reaches Teresa and, after a long minute of thought and contemplation from Marcus, he eventually says, “Hmmm fine. You win. We’ll leave.”

“Wait,” Sonya reappears in the hallway. She walks closer to Brenda and Marcus, on the ground, the wind coming through the now wide-open hole in the front of the house billows fine pieces of flyaway hair around her face. At her request Brenda hands the gun over to Sonya, who takes on the role of pointing the gun at his head.

“Where is it?” Sonya asks, but when her question is only met with bewilderment, she swears and says, “The tracker in my leg! Show me where it is.”

Marcus lifts a weak, shaky hand to point at a spot just below Sonya’s knee before taking hold of her ankle and hurling her to the ground. From the kitchen Craig uses this distraction to kick his legs up, pushing Teresa off him with one swift hit to the shin, and the gun out of Minho’s hands. Thomas kicks him in the ribs before he can get a hold of the gun, but Craig rolls away and manages to jump to his feet, anyway, and run towards Brenda and Sonya.

Behind him, Newt feels movement and spins the gun around just in time to catch Nick trying to get away. “Over there!” Newt yells, gesturing with the gun, “Stand over there, now!”

Everything that happens in the next minute feels like a dream sequence. Each event rolls through the air and dances around each other in perfect tandem; Gally and Fry chasing down Marcus and knocking him back on to the floor, the knife that he pulls out from the waistband of his pants slices the back of Frypan’s hand. The bursts of Thomas’ heavy feet against the floor as he runs into the hallway to help, Minho, tackled by Craig struggling with him against a wall as they fight for control of the gun. Harriet, running through the hallway and shouting.

Newt abandons Nick and races over to Minho and Craig. Thomas appears to be wrestling the man off Minho, gun pointed at his back and aiming, but there isn’t a clear shot and too much of a chance of hitting Thomas.

Sonya cries, “_No!_” and a gunshot bursts in Newt ears. Heart launching into his throat, he looks to see Sonya with the gun in her hands and Marcus on the floor, unmoving. A steady puddle of blood begins to form beneath him. Gally slumbs against the wall, wide-eyed and breathing deep. Frypan stands above him, the same.

Reality shifts and begins to flow in slow motion. Another gunshot rings out before Craig falls back, hard, releasing his hold of Thomas’ neck once Teresa appears and pulls him away. He trips over a fallen chair and falls back against the table, the side of his head catching on a jagged corner. There is a horrible crunch before he falls to the ground, still.

All that is left is Minho, on the ground, clutching his leg and crying out in pain. 

Blood seeps into the front of Newt’s shirt and stains his skin, but he scarcely notices. Minho’s grunts of pain are like red hot pikes stabbing into Newt skin. Every step they take when carrying him up the stairs brings froth another, before depositing him as gently as they possibly can on the bed. Minho’s head lolls back against the mattress, his face contorting in pain. Newt’s vision swims and the room sways and turns on its head all around him as he stands, useless, in front of his best friend and watches as Harriet kneels beside Minho on the bed, red seeping through the cracks between her fingers as she applies pressure to the wound.

“The bullet’s still in there,” Harriet says, breathing sharp but steady and shoulders back as she fights to keep her composure, “We have to get it out.”

Fry rakes his hands through the top of his short hair – even he, by far the calmest of their group, is one hair away from hyperventilation, “How the fuck are we supposed to do that?”

“Find something!” Harriet spits, “Anything, I don’t care. We have to do this now!”

Blood. So much of it, everywhere. It covers Minho like a blanket and crawls over Newt’s body like a parasite, crawling like insects, wrapping him up tight as it makes it’s way up from his toes to his head, slivering into his mouth, wandering, seeking –

“Newt?”

“Hurry up!”

“I can’t find anything!”

“Get something from the kitchen!”

“Like what, genius?”

“Someone check the stuff Jeff left behind!”

“Newt?”

Minho goes so still all of a sudden Newt’s heart almost stops but, no, his chest is still moving, face slack and only unconscious. Sound roars in Newt’s ears. Outside he hears voices, shouting and calling out, Brenda’s voice, the sound wheels on dirt, a car speeding away, more shouting, a door bursting open and his fathers voice, yelling, his mother’s breath in his ear and her hands in his hair, she doesn’t realise she’s hurting him, the closet door opening and his mother is out of his arms, she rips a bit of Newt’s hair from his scalp, she is crying, he is crying –

“_Newt!_”

Thomas’ voice pulls him out of his mind. The screaming stops and the blood retreats. Thomas is staring at him with wide eyes. His hands are on Newt’s shoulders, gripping tight. He has blood on him, too.

The ringing in Newt’s ears stops and he slowly becomes re-aware of the world around him: Thomas. Harriet leaning on the bed and speaking softly to Minho, who has now begun to profusely swear in hissed whispers, Teresa clutching her stomach, looking sick. Gally is following after Harriet and doing whatever she tells him. Downstairs: Fry rushing around desperately for something to get the bullet out with. Brenda and Sonya’s voices, Sonya’s high, clipped tone and Brenda’s softer, assuring one. 

Minho is breathing shallowly on the bed, eyebrows pinched and teeth bared. Harriet and Gally are removing his pants as carefully as possible for better access to the bullet.

Fry runs back into the room, then, a pair of long surgical like tongs in his hand. They’re small enough to do the job, but Newt and even Thomas’ faces turn pale at the sight of them, knowing what they will be used for, and Minho almost passes out again.

“This is all we have,” Fry says, weakly.

Harriet wipes a bead of sweat off her forehead, “Fuck. Okay. _Shit_. It’ll have to do.” She takes the utensil from Fry, and asks everyone to leave the room. When Thomas and Newt begin to reluctantly follow, Harriet jumps and says, “No, not you two,” the same time that Minho’s hand shoots out to catch both of their wrists in a tight grasp, where they are holding one another’s.

“I need you to hold him still,” Harriet says, and Newt might actually throw up.

The bullet does not come easily, and Newt’s heart stops twice when Minho goes limp, again, against his chest. The minute the metal touches the wound Minho, in a knee-jerk reaction, fights against all of them. Thomas secures his ankles and Newt pulles his knees in to pin Minho’s torso between them, holding his shoulders as still as humanly possible while Harriet works, teardrop of sweat on the tip of her nose and eyebrows pinched in concentration.

When the bullet is finally out they all collectively flop in relief and exhaustion. Minho had passed out halfway through, and Newt moves out from under him to allow him to lie flat. There is so much blood, absolutely everywhere. They’ll need to change the sheets soon.

Harriet is dressing the wound with gauze Gally brought up, and Thomas is touching her shoulder and murmuring, “Hey, you did great. Okay?”

Harriet nods, winding the gauze around Minho’s thigh, one hand under his knee. “I should check on Sonya, she …”

Newt clears his throat, shakes his head and says, “We’ll do that. You stay with Minho.”

They arrive downstairs during the apex of an argument. The hushed whispers and cracking voices in a feeble attempt to stay quiet pierces at Newt’s skull, now pounding, and leads to him snapping, “What’s going on here?” as soon as his feet land on the bottom step.

Teresa says, “Nick gone. He climbed in their car after Minho was – When we were all distracted and left.”

Sonya had been shaking her head all the way through Teresa’s explanation, and is still doing so currently, “He’s not a threat. Trust me, he hated that place almost as much as I did. My guess is he’s on to way to Texas by now.”

Gally looks as if he is either going to have a conniption or has already had a conniption and another one is on the way. “Oh, he’s not, is he?” He spits, “Funny, that’s what you said about the guy at the markets, and look how that turned out.”

Sonya is clutching her middle, a deep bruise steadily forming on the forehead. She looks tiny, miserable, and racked with guilt. Newt moves to slip his arm around her shoulders and Sonya leans into him with a quiet, barley there sigh. 

Brenda says, “Stand down, Gally.”

Gally stares at her with wide eyes. “Are you kidding me, right now?”

Fry lifts his palms up and announces, “I’m going to help Harriet,” and leaves. Newt watches him go enviously.

Gally doesn’t stop to take a breath, and carries on, “What, so we’re just supposed to stay here and hope no one else comes here? We don’t have a door –” he gestures wildly to the wide, gaping hole in the house, which is a problem that everyone seems to be communally putting aside for later, “Minho is upstairs hurt and bleeding, and we don’t have supplies. But what do we have? An ex-prostitute with an army of psychos after her.”

Newt snaps, “Fuck off, Gally,” the same time that Thomas surges forward, plants both hands on his chest and shoves him so hard his head snaps back against the wall, back colliding with it painfully.

“The hell –?” Gally starts.

Thomas cuts him off, “What is your problem, Gally? Huh? No one is forcing you to stay here, so if you want to go, then, by all means …” Thomas points at the hole.

“Guys,” Teresa snaps, “_Stop_.”

“Listen to your side dish, Tommy,” Gally says, “Or would that be Newt?”

Thomas slams him against the wall, again, and Newt and Teresa both shout, “_Thomas!_”

The snap of their voices together pulls Thomas back to himself, and releases Gally and stands back. When he is free, Gally goes to move toward the stairs, but Teresa catches him by the collar of his shirt and spins him in the opposite direction toward the front porch.

“No,” she said, “You go outside. Air. Now.”

Newt leaves Sonya to find Thomas with his hands braced on either side of the kitchen sink, face dripping with water and taking deep, measured breaths. He starts the moment Newt touches him but relaxes in no time after, realising it’s him.

“Hey,” Newt says, allowing his hand to trace the length of Thomas’ arm from his shoulder to rest on his whist. Two fingers trace over Thomas’ pulse point; the quick but steadying beats are comforting, and grounding, almost.

“Hi,” Thomas breathes, leaning forward until his forehead presses to Newt’s temple, their noses brushing together, “Sorry. He – I – He fucking – I hate him.”

Newt shakes his head, tightening his grip on Thomas’ wrist until he stands straight and turns into his body properly. “Don’t worry about it,” Newt says.

“Look, Newt, I …” a worried gleam reflects in Thomas’ eyes, “What he said about Teresa, it’s not –”

“I know,” Newt says, nodding.

Thomas frowns, “What? No, Newt, you –”

Newt says, “Thomas,” and tries very hard not to react to the way Thomas flinches at the use of his full name, “It’s not the time.”

There are dead men on the floor, one of which is behind them right now. His best friend is unconscious and injured, needing painkillers that he is frankly unsure they have at their disposal, and above all, the thought at the forefront of Newt’s mind is making sure everyone remains on their feet.

Brenda calls Thomas away to help with the bodies with a grim expression, and Newt finds Gally on the porch, hands braced on the railing, mirroring Thomas perfectly.

Newt announces his approach with a quick and loveless, “Gally,” and when Gally turns to look at him, opening his mouth to talk, Newt beats him to it, “I know you’re scared of those blokes coming back, and worried about Minho. So am I. But do not ever,” Newt takes a slow step forward, “_Ever _speak to either of them like that again. Do you understand?”

Slowly, eventually, Gally nods.

“Good. Because all of this,” Newt waves a finger in the air to indicate the entire farm, “only works if we stick together and get along. Okay?”

“Yeah, Newt,” Gally sighs. He sounds exhausted, and when Newt looks at him – a boy his own age, shoulders hunched, lean frame, losing weight, scared and uncertain about the future – he almost feels bad. 

Newt says, “I don’t like you. I’m not sure if Minho likes you. I know he probably thinks you’re attractive, but that’ll disappear the moment he realises you’re a complete shit head – if he hasn’t already, that is – and especially if you’re being one towards his friends.” He shrugs, “Just something to keep in mind.”

Newt leaves Gally on the porch, eyes roving over the midnight horizon, cool wind ruffling his hair.

Newt does not sleep that night.

He dozes off for thirty minutes, and dreams of Thomas’ heart stopping in his sleep, leaving Newt to find him in the morning.

Newt wakes, gasping, and spends the remainder of the night with his head on Thomas’ chest, listening to his heartbeat. 

Sonya sits on the porch swing with her knees hugged close to her chest, eyes pointed glassy and unfocussed toward the sunrise. Judging from the deep circles under her eyes Newt guesses she also hadn’t slept a wink last night. 

“Good morning,” Newt says when he approaches, and the sudden appearance of his voice makes her jump.

“Oh, hey, Newt. Morning,” Sonya says, relaxing again.

“Are you okay?” Newt asks as he takes a seat next to her, and Sonya shrugs. Four inches from her ankle is a white bandage wrapped around her leg, with a small red stain in the middle. Newt settles his mug of bitter tea between his thighs (the thought of ingesting anything into his stomach, let alone food, made him feel sick. The rumble in his stomach, however, had a different opinion overall, and together they met with a compromise).

Newt asks, “Did you want me to bring you anything?”

Sonya shakes her head minimally, “No, it’s fine, thank you. Did you see if Harriet’s awake?”

The last Newt had seen of Harriet was when he and Thomas climbed the stairs sometime after midnight to check on Minho, and found her curled in a chair at the edge of the bed, fighting sleep. She stayed with Minho, just in case he woke up in pain, or sick, or just needed anything during the night. He tells Sonya as much.

Sonya nods, and they are quiet for a little bit. Newt drinks his tea and she watches the sunrise in a kind of numb silence where simply taking a sip and swallowing it down feels too loud in his ears. Eventually, Sonya takes a deep breath that turns into a sort of hiccup which makes Newt look at her, startled.

“I just,” Sonya begins, a hand lifting to wipe a falling tear from her eye, and missing it, “This is all my fault. If I had just told Gally the truth then he wouldn’t have made me go with him, but … ever since that day, when we found Winston and he was all …” she pauses to wipe away another tear, “I keep seeing it in my head. I keep seeing the graves, and I – I just wanted to get out for a few hours.”

“Hey,” Newt says, shifting closer and slipping his arm around her, as he had done last night. Sonya lays her head on his shoulder. “Listen to me, alright? This isn’t your fault – No. No buts. It _isn’t_. You didn’t make those wankers come here. You didn’t make them do – do what they did. You have nothing to be guilty about.”

A small twitch of a smile forms in the corner of Sonya’s mouth – just barely but there nonetheless – and she buries her face in Newt’s shoulder, again.

“Thank you, Newt.” And then, “Could I have some of that? It’s cold out here …”

Newt hands Sonya his mug, and watches as her face instantly contorts, struggling to down the first sip, “_Eugh_. This tastes awful. Why would you willingly do this to yourself?” 

The wind picks up in the east, and a potential dust storm warning comes over the radio when, at the same time, Minho’s condition begins to worsen. He’s developed a fever during the night, Harriet tells them, not an hour after Newt and Sonya have come back inside.

“I’m sorry, what?” Newt asks. 

“He’s burning up,” Harriet says. Her face is ashen and her eyes look red and weary. It is very clear she has been up all night long, “He’s at 104 degrees, at least. He needs proper meds, and if we don’t get his temperature down soon, then …”

Everyone stands around the living room. By the door, Fry and Brenda are busy taping up an old tarp over the hole where the front door used to be, and look over in shock. Newt’s fingertips begin to prickle.

“What about the pain killers we already have?” Thomas pipes in, coming to stand beside Newt.

Harriet shakes her head. “I tried them last night, but it did next to nothing. I don’t think they’re strong enough.”

Newt’s knees shake, and he allows himself to fall back. “Is he awake right now?” he asks.

“I …” Harriet glances up at the ceiling as if she has the ability to see through walls, “He was just now.”

Without another word Newt jumps back up from the couch and climbs the stairs two at a time, only pausing when he reaches the door to the bedroom where Minho is. For a crazy moment he feels as if he should knock, that the image of Minho, flushed and weak and in pain is too much for his mind to comprehend, and thus immediately must replace it with something else; something more normal and boring. Minho lounged in his bed back in Vegas, reading a book, or changing his clothes, or literally anything else than what is currently happening on the other side of this door.

Newt shakes his head and turns the squeaky knob as quietly as possible, pushing the door open. Minho is definitely awake; however, it is more in theory than in practice. His eyes blink unfocused on the ceiling, his breaths coming in shallow. The air coming through the open windows is cool, but it doesn’t appear to be doing anything to help.

Newt approaches the bed and, hesitantly, says, “Min?”

Minho hums at the sound of his voice, and makes noise like a weak moan. Newt steps closer and leans down, trying again, “Minho, are you awake?”

Minho only moans again, and when Newt places a hand on his wrist he is shocked (despite Harriet’s words, despite knowing full well what to expect when entering the room and seeing Minho like this, but being in perfect denial regardless) to feel that his skin is hot. Too hot.

Newt pulls his hand back and asks, “Water?” and when he receives another moan, this one with a slight confirming lilt at the end, Newt hurries over to retrieve the water bottle beside the bed, and lift it to Minho’s lips. It is lukewarm and grey, but it is all they have, and Newt almost feels bad giving it to Minho to drink.

His friend gulps it down and instantly collapses back against the pillows. After a minute it is clear that Minho has fallen back asleep, and Newt leaves the room as he came, slowly shutting the door. 

For the rest of the day, it feels to Newt like everything is shifting around in a slow, waterlike pace, and he is simply the onlooker, watching helplessly from the sidelines.

He feels useless, more so than he ever has. Every time he climbs the stairs to check on Minho, which he has taken to doing every hour, on the hour, and finds him in the same state that he’d left him in, or worse. The air in the room turns musky and thick, the open windows working negatively against them and, eventually, dust storm warnings grow in urgency and they are forced to close all of them. Newt tastes bitter sand on his tongue and feels his chest constrict merely at the concept of another storm.

Everyone but Thomas is tiptoeing around Newt, as if he is simply a time bomb that is due to ignite any minute. Teresa keeps her eyes downcast as she lays a damp cloth on Minho’s forehead that will just turn lukewarm in ten minutes, anyway, and smiles politely as she leaves. For a moment she stills, toes of her feet catching against the floor in her stride. She hesitates and moves to place her hand on Newt’s shoulder but stops, and leaves. Brenda wordlessly pushes her plate of sad strawberries toward Newt when he joins her at the table, and Newt tells her no, despite not having eaten anything since last night and is, objectively, quite hungry.

Frypan, Sonya, and Harriet tend to the crops. Gally doesn’t meet his eye.

Thomas ends up finding Newt on the rickety back porch, where he stands within the small open conservatory and busies himself with staring out at the grey sky between the mountains.

“Nice weather we’re having,” Thomas says, nose scrunched, saddling up beside Newt.

Newt looks at him, startled. “You should be inside, there’s a storm coming.”

“Potentially,” Thomas says, before pulling a cucumber out of his jacket pocket and handing it over to Newt with a hopeful expression. “Please eat something.”

For a moment Newt considers saying no, but then what use will he be to Minho if he’s passed out on the floor with low blood sugar, and takes the cucumber from Thomas.

“I don’t know what’s going to happen,” Newt admits to Thomas, a minute and half into the cucumber later, “I don’t – I _always_ know. That’s how it’s worked with us, you know, I figure things out and Minho, he.” Newt runs a hand through his hair, and when he pulls it back it is shaking, “He was always there, along for the ride. No questions asked.”

“Newt.”

“I was the one who suggested we sign up for the Project, you know?” Newt says, “Me. Minho didn’t want to. He said it was just a cheap and easy way for WCKD to get what they wanted and then, when they were done, toss us to the curb like off meat. He said that. And would you look at what happened.”

Thomas places his hand over Newt’s. His skin feels warm where Newt is cold, chapped skin under rough pads. Two fingers slip around his wrist to brush against Newt’s pulse point, tapping twice.

“Newt,” Thomas tries again, “This isn’t your fault.”

Newt shakes his head, eyes remaining steady on the horizon despite the burn he feels from Thomas’ gaze on the side of his head, and ignored his own words to Sonya. “I don’t know what’s going to happen,” he repeats, a tear escaping despite all his stubborn attempts to keep them at bay. Thomas presses his forehead to Newt’s shoulder.

They wait until the wind picks up, and the tears finally stop. 

Minho refuses to eat dinner. Thomas makes a remark that Newt is rubbing off on him, but his tone is completely void of all humour, and his eyebrows pinch when he says it. He leans beside the bed with tight crossed arms and watches the window, and the budding gales of wind outside. 

There is a storm brewing in the north and is due to head east. If all remains as predicted, it should bypass them entirely.

It is by far the most amazing news Newt has heard in months.

They begin to feed him painkillers like candy, but the medicine does next to nothing to quell his fever. Harriet thinks it is because the certain brand they have is too weak for Minho, better suited to headaches, minor aches and mains, and low-level fevers. Newt wants to throw up. He wants to scream, and shout and punch his fist through a wall or the face of the next person who tells him – or even _insinuates_ – that they do not have what they need to help Minho.

When Minho begins to shiver and throw up, the last of Newt’s resolve crumbles in to thin air and blows away like dust.

“Minho needs proper medicine,” Newt says, “From a real doctor. Preferably a hospital.”

“The nearest hospital is in the city,” Brenda says, “And that’s over four hours drive, one way. Not to mention the absolute miracle you’ll need to get past the wall. Also, Minho’s too weak to travel.”

“He doesn’t have to travel,” Fry says, “And we don’t have to go to the city.”

“What’re you talking about?” Thomas asks.

Fry says, “The towns, the ones we nab supplies from. There’s one little ways out, but I’ve seen it driving past. You know,” he turns to Gally and taps him on the knee to get his attention, “the one we never went to because it was too big?”

“More likely to get caught,” Gally murmurs, slowly straightening out his posture. “Yeah. Population 1,000. They’ll have to have a hospital, or at least something smaller.”

“Alright then,” Newt nods, standing up from the couch, “Let’s go.”

“No,” Gally says, at the same time Teresa grabs Thomas’ shoulder. “No. Dust storm warnings. You,” he looks at Thomas, “can’t risk going out there if one does hit. And you,” he says to Newt, “should be here in case anything happens. Me and Fry will go.”

Not ten minutes later, Newt is helping Fry and Gally set up one of the jeeps. Handing Gally a radio, he says, “Be careful.”

Gally nods, shrugging on his jacket, “We will.”

“Yeah, Newt,” Fry says, coming around the car to where Newt and Gally are standing, expression equally is determined, “We’ll be back before you know it.”

“Gally,” Newt begins, leaning his head into the window of the driver’s side, peering in at Gally, “I just want to say I don’t think you’re a complete asshole. Not all the time, at least.”

Gally stares at him, mouth opening and closing once, twice, before he clears his throat and the smallest of grins tugs at his lips, and he says, “Thanks, Newt.”

“See you soon,” Fry says, poking his head around Gally to wave at Newt, and without further dallying, they drive off into the night, tires spinning dust in their wake. 

Gally and Fry have been gone for two hours when Minho stirs. Newt, sitting by his bedside, weary from lack of sleep and ill from the smell of blood, had been dozing in and out of conciousness, his head dropping on to his chin when he hears it. Minho calling his name, weakly.

“Newt,” Minho says, and … his voice. It is far too frail, hoarse like he hasn’t had a drop of water to drink in days, and that combined with the glassy, far away look in his eyes instantly turns Newt’s blood to lead.

“Minho, hey.” Newt kneels by his bed, “Listen to me. It’s going to be okay, alright?”

Minho flutters his eyes, and Newt touches his forehead to test his fever. Hot, still hot. Newt swears.

“Newt …”

“We’re going to fix you, soon, okay? Gally and Fry are on their way to getting you help. Just hang on.”

“Newt, stop,” Minho says, “It’s okay,” and it sounds, suddenly, like Minho is trying to console him. Panic fills his body and turns the corner of his vision white, and when Newt straightens up to call for Harriet, Minho’s hand on his stops him.

Minho says, “I keep thinking of Winston.”

“Stop,” Newt says, “Just be quiet.”

“I keep. I keep thinking about that game we used to play. _Who had it worse?_ Do you remember?” Minho coughs, deep and raking. Newt breaks and calls for Harriet, but the name that ends up coming out of his mouth is _Thomas_. 

“And you know … ‘m not sure who won, in the end.”

Newt drops to his knees by the bed when Thomas appears in the doorway, out of breath. His eyes widen instantly when he takes in the scene before him. Newt meets Minho’s gaze and finds nothing in it.

He feels a scream well up inside him that will never be free, and will rest within him for eternity.

“Gally. Fry, come in.”

Someone is touching Newt. He shrugs them off, sharp and with reproach, and remains hunched with his back against the wall, head between his knees. The gentle rasp of Thomas’ voice drifts to his ears in a muted wave as he attempts to contact Gally and Frypan over the radio. They are not picking up. Static walks side by side Thomas words. The windows are open in the downstairs living room. The soft breeze entering the house tastes faintly of sulphur, and for a moment Newt thinks, _Good_. 

“Fry, do you read me?” A click, a pause, more static. “Gally?”

Static. White noise. It pollutes the air and singes the ends of Newt’s hair until he smells smoke. It pulses in his ears until his fingers and toes begin to tingle with the sensation, until all he is is just another dead wavelength, a dead frequency, and dead body in the room right above his head –

Thomas slams his hand on the table, and it sparks in the air. “_Come in_, guys. Shit.”

Newt lifts his head. Everyone but Thomas is staring at him like he is dead instead of Minho, and flinch away when they see the whites of his eyes.

Thomas sighs and switches off the radio, running both hands through his hair and gripping tight before standing up from the table. “They’re not picking up,” he says, “Something might be blocking the transmission.”

On the loveseat, with her knees pulled close to her chest, Sonya says, “The storm.”

Her voice is full and wet, the ending consonant pronounced with an accompanied sniffle, and for one brief moment, deep, hot anger flares up inside Newt at the sound it.

“Maybe,” Teresa answers. She has come to sit beside Newt, looking over at him but pretending not to every time he so much as breathes too hard. He wants her gone. He wants everyone to leave. “It’s not unusual. That, or they’ve just left the radios in the car.”

Brenda says, quietly, “We’ll just have to be patient. They’ll pick up, eventually.”

“How far away did Fry say this town was?” Thomas asks.

“Two hours one way,” Harriet says, “They’re either there, or on the way back…” her voice trails off, and Newt doesn’t have to turn his head to know she is looking at him.

Newt breathes out, deeply, and allows his legs to slip off the couch. The souls of his shoes make a noise that wouldn’t be loud at all, in ordinary circumstances, but right now it makes everyone in the room jump. 

“Tell them not to worry,” Newt says.

Thomas pauses under the archway, shoulders stiff and fiddling with the small radio in his hands. “Newt,” he begins.

“It’s no use now,” Newt says, standing up, “What’s the point?”

Teresa reaches out for his hand. He snatches it away at the slightest touch of her skin. Teresa’s eyes are a sad, clear blue swimming with unshed tears. Newt cannot stand to look at her right now. “Newt, hey …” she says.

Static bursts over the radio, suddenly – one sharp hiss – before Frypan’s voice comes over the other end of the line. Everyone stands very still and holds their breath, Newt including. Thomas runs for the speaker like it is a race, and lands on it with a sort of leap in the air.

Fry’s voice comes in over the line, “Guys, listen …”

“Frypan,” Thomas says, out of breath, “Fry … Look, I.” Thomas glances at Newt, “Guys –”

“We told you,” Fry continues, talking over Thomas as if he hadn’t heard him, “We don’t have anything you’d want.”

Thomas’ hand pauses mid-air upon lifting the speaker to his lips. Newt’s heartbeat spikes at the off, cautious tone, and he rushes over to Thomas, the girls right beside him.

“What’s going on?” Newt whispers.

Thomas shakes his head, frowning. “I’m not sure?”

His attempt to switch on the speaker again is halted by Teresa’s hand shooting out and stopping him. “No, don’t,” she says, “something’s wrong.”

The radio sparks again, and this time an unknown voice comes over the line. “Actually,” it says, “it looks a lot like you’ve got something we’d want.”

“It’s just vitamins,” Gally jumps in, voice laced with barley restrained panic, “We’ve got sick kids. They –”

A gunshot bursts over the line right before Gally and Frypan begin to yell at whoever it is they’re speaking to, and everyone jumps, and Newt hears it, then; the echo. Not over the radio but somewhere in the distance.

Somewhere close. 

Thomas jumps back from the table so fast that his chair tumbles backward. “They made it back,” he says, tone dripping with unease, right before pushing past everyone gathered around the table and barrelling through the tarp of the make-shit front door.

“Tommy!” Newt yells after him and, before he can even stop to think about it, is following him out the door.

The others shout as they rip into the cold, night air. By-passing the steps entirely, Newt lands on the hard ground in a way which actively reminds him of his newly injured leg. Gritting his teeth, Newt pushes the thought and the sharp pain from his mind and chases after Thomas’ figure in the darkness as fast as he possibly can. 

“Tommy, wait!” Newt calls out as loud as he possibly dares, but Thomas’ does not show any indication that he heard him.

Thomas is fast, and steadily adding distance between himself and Newt and Newt, already panting, leg shooting electricity up at him with every stride, is falling behind. They sprint through the long-dead cornfield when Newt’s ears catch the heavy hiss of one of the radio’s, behind him, and he realises someone else has followed them out.

Newt runs, and pants, and grunts in pain, calling, _Tommy stop! _and _Wait! _and the more occasional _Fuck!_ but Thomas continues to run and Newt continues to chase after him. They reach a hill and Thomas finally begins to slow down enough for Newt to catch up, when dim, long beams over the grassy landscape come into view; two yellow lights in the distance, and the faint boxy shape of the Jeep, surrounded by what looks to be two or three people. They have torches and – Newt’s stomach drops – guns, and they are pointing them through the windows of the car, where Frypan and Gally sit.

Up ahead Thomas trips, catching himself on the palms of his hands and is now practically crawling uphill, whilst whoever has followed them out begins to catch up.

“_Tommy!_” Newt hisses, again, and the radio sparks again as Newt finally – finally – comes within arm’s reach of Thomas.

“I won’t ask again …”

“… I said we don’t have anything …”

“… think you’re lying …”

“… feel free to check, asshole …”

“… _Gally!_”

“They’re in trouble!” This is Thomas, voice strained, lungs working against him, right before Newt catches him in his arms, right before Teresa slams into them from behind, gasping, her hair swinging up and hitting Newt in the face, and right before the two bright – so bright, even from this distance – lights explode, and twin gunshots echo through the valley like thunderclaps.

“_No!_”

Newt grips Thomas’ shoulders and forces him on to the ground right as Teresa cups her hand over Thomas’ mouth, and they all hide among the tall grass. Newt’s heart pounds hard against his rib cage, blood puling loudly in his ears. Thomas is panting deep, lungfuls of air below him, pushing his shoulders back and tugging at Teresa’s hand, attempting to dislodge both of them, and Newt grips him harder. The valley twists sound and carries it over the wind to make it seem like the bird in the tree, all the way at the other end of the land, is right beside your ear, flying over your head. At this distance they have a very small chance of the men hearing them, or looking over and seeing three figures in the distance, huddled, and Newt silently prays it is dark enough, and that the grass they lay in is tall enough to conceal them.

The radio in Teresa’s free hand, the one resting over Newt’s middle back, sparks, and she pulls her hand away from Thomas to switch it off, her movements quick and panicked. Thomas gasps but, thankfully, does not try and crawl away and, instead, allows his head to drop forward on to the ground. His shoulders quake, sporadically, but he makes no sound.

Newt, Thomas, and Teresa remain huddled in the long grass for minutes that stretch and bend into what feels like hours of torture, crouched and hiding and silent. Newt drops his head onto Thomas’ shoulder and Teresa presses her face into his, her arms coming around to circle them both.

The wind changes, Thomas pulls his face out of the grass, and the men leave. Only once the sound of tires fade in the distance do they allow themselves to untangle from each other. The three of them sit back on their heels, blinking and unfocused, like one confused and exhausted entity. The feeling of failure and loss weighs deeply on Newt’s heart, dragging his bones down to the earth beneath them. It ebbs and flows with the hunch of Thomas’ shoulders, the hands gripping his hair, and Teresa’s high sob, bursting free from her lungs after being held in for so long.

The Jeep’s engine runs in the distance. The headlights cast a sickly yellow sheen over the dirt road before it. 

Six mounds of dirt. Four of them with letters at their heads. The letters read: _W, F, M, G. _

The letters shift in Newt’s mind, bending and rearranging themselves in space, and when they are done, they only read _WCKD_.

Newt dreams that Minho and Gally, Frypan, Winston and Jeff are standing over his bed, staring down at him with pale, inhuman eyes, and wakes covered in a think sheet of sweat to discover that two days have passed since he’d fallen onto the couch, and didn’t get back up. Newt becomes aware of the sound of their makeshift front door flapping against the frame, and blinks his eyes open to pale sunlight shining through the window. Thomas is asleep at his feet, face ashen and mouth slightly open, with the occasional wheeze as he breathes in and out. Balancing on his elbow, Newt leans down to brush a piece of hair off Thomas’ forehead, where it is falling into his eyes. Thomas’ nose wrinkles for a moment, but he does not wake. 

His body feels light in the way it usually does when he has not put anything into it for a while, and when Newt thinks back to the last thing he ate, the cucumber Thomas had offered him, his stomach instantly rumbles at the memory.

He finds Harriet sitting at the small table in the kitchen-slash-dining-room, gazing through the open window with a mug between her hands, lost in thought. Upon further inspection, Newt realises that the mug is, actually, empty, and makes it through making himself tea, and putting himself some breakfast (crackers, which he places on to a plate for principle rather than anything else) before Harriet clues into his presence in the room. She starts when Newt sets his plate and mug down on the table and sits opposite her.

“Care for a refill?” Newt asks, gesturing down to her empty mug.

Harriet blinks at him like she either hadn’t realised he’s awake, or she herself is awake. She then stares down at her mug, frowning in confusion. “Oh,” she says, “I must’ve forgotten to make some.”

Newt taps his nail against the handle of the mug, and quietly bites into a cracker. “What time is it?”

“Almost ten,” Harriet replies, blinking and rolling her shoulders. She turns more attentively toward Newt, and asks, “Are you okay? I mean,” she shakes her head, “That’s a stupid question to ask, of course you’re not, but … How’re you feeling?”

Newt swallows the cracker, and doesn’t say _I keep seeing their faces when I close my eyes. _“Fine,” Newt answers.

“You know,” Harriet says, “When we were leaving the house in Vegas, I noticed something.”

Newt pauses mid-bite and stares at her. “What do you mean?” Newt asks, leaning forward.

Harriet sucks on her bottom lip for a moment, eyebrows knitting and eyes far away, reminiscing, “I’m not sure, but there was a man. He wasn’t anyone else who lived on the hill, but he didn’t exactly look like he belonged with WCKD, either.” She then looks at Newt, and says, “I think he owned that house. I think he lived there before us, or … or _while_ we lived there.”

Like finding a missing puzzle piece that’s hidden under a rug, behind a bookshelf, and in between the cracks in the floor, everything finally comes into full view. It’s so clear now that the realisation almost nocks Newt off his chairs. Instead, he falls back against it, a huff of hair escaping his lungs.

Of course, it had all been a lie. There never was any reward, no promise of safety and security. They’d never had the room for it, not ever. So instead they rented out summer homes, gave them all hope, and ripped all of it away when the time was up.

Had it all been a lie, Newt wonders? Had they planned to give housing to the Donors in the beginning, when the entire campaign began and the government announced plans for the Callisto Project? Did they run into complications somewhere down the line, but had invested too much time and money and resources into the Program to back out? Were the resources the issue, or did the countless number of storms and disasters utterly wipe what was left of the earth’s nutrients and spit it out dry?

_Are you doing this to everyone?_ Newt asked the question to Janson that day, a day which feels like years ago, now.

And he finally has an answer.

“Newt.” Harriet’s voice pulls him from his thoughts, and he looks up to find her gazing back at him, forlorn, and she says, “Sonya and I have decided that we’re going to go.”

Newt asks, “Go where?” even though he knows perfectly well. 

The scuff of a shoe against the chipped linoleum catches Newt’s attention, and he turns to find Sonya leaning against the entryway wall, arms crossed at her waist.

Her eyes are sad when she says, “It isn’t safe for you guys with me here.”

“That’s bullshit,” Newt says.

Sonya closes her eyes, says, “Newt,” and Newt wishes, rapidly, that everyone would stop saying his name. 

“No,” he says, standing up from the table, “It is, Sonya. What use is you two leaving now going to –”

“Tracker or no tracker, it still isn’t safe. Those men last night might not have been from Denver, but what if the next ones are? I can’t –” her voice cracks, “I won’t put anyone else in danger.”

Newt shakes his head. Behind Sonya he spots Thomas poke his head over the side of the couch, ears picking up on the conversation, and upstairs he hears footsteps, heading towards the stairs.

Sonya continues, “The crops aren’t doing well. They haven’t for a while, not since that storm that killed Winston. You know that, Newt, you’re out there every day. There isn’t enough food for all of us, not anymore.” Sonya stretches her palm out for Harriet to take, and says, “We’re already decided.”

Sonya and Harriet leave after lunch. Along with one of the cars, after much persuasion from Brenda, they agree to take with them a bag of food, and two day’s worth of water.

“Where will you go?” Teresa asks, as they’re preparing the car.

Harriet shrugs, zipping up her jacket, and says, “North. Maybe somewhere near Montana. It’s supposed to be nice up there.”

Teresa hugs both of them tight for a long moment, and afterward comes to stand by Newt and Thomas, wiping at her cheeks. Next is Brenda, who throws her arms around both of them at the same time, and mumbles, “Take care,” into Harriet’s shoulder, voice thick with emotion. When Harriet moves on to Thomas, Sonya walks up close to Newt, and for a moment they stand there, looking at each other, as Newt searches for words that won’t sound strange on his tongue.

“So,” he says.

“So,” Sonya replies, before hiccupping and encircling her arms around Newt’s waist, and buries her face in his shoulder. _Okay_, Newt thinks, as he hugs her back, equally as hard, _this works too_.

“’m going to miss you, blondie,” Newt says, face pressed into her hair. The long, straw-coloured strands tickle his nose, but he only squeezes her tighter.

“I’m going to miss you, too,” Sonya says, and when she pulls back her eyes are red and glistening. “See you in the next life.”

“See you,” Newt murmurs, chest tight.

“Well,” Harriet begins, releasing Thomas so that Sonya can pounce on him, too, “I guess this is it.”

“I guess it is,” Thomas says, threading his fingers in between Newt’s, and Newt almost winces at the sound of his voice; hoarse and rough with overuse, but it is the first time he has spoken today. On their left, Brenda slips her arm around Teresa’s shoulder, jaw tightening.

“I just wanted to say,” Harriet begins, as Sonya slips her arm around her waist to rest on her hip, thumb curling around a single belt loop, “You guys are the best people I’ve ever met. Before I was alone and scared, practically growling at anything that even looked at me.” She huffs a laugh, “Honestly, I don’t even know where I’d be right now, without you.”

Harriet looks down at Sonya, and says, softer, “Any of you.”

They wave from the window as they drive away, tires kicking up dirt in their wake. Everyone stands and watches until the car is but a speck in the distance, and then gone completely.

And just like that, there were four.

The dreams come in waves; stark and vivid and entirely submerging so that Newt does not go a single morning without waking up feeling like he had been drowning. Sand, always; sand beneath his fingertips, where he sits on a beach and draws patterns – not a regular beach but one where the stars touch the water and comets circle above his head in an endless helix. Sand which turns to sugar on his tongue. Sand which is iridescent and dances in the air like a billion fireflies, settling on Newt’s skin and sinking down past flesh and bone until he is also, simply, a spectrum of light and colours.

Thomas, with golden eyes and golden freckles, where golden dust protrudes out from his lips whenever he speaks. Sonya standing on a hill with yards long hair, Teresa walking along an empty high way, everywhere she steps turns to gold beneath her shoes. Brenda, inside a circus tent spinning in the air on a ribbon made of golden light.

Sand, still sand; filling the house to ankle height, so that they must walk through it every day. Sand wiping the valley of grass and replacing it with itself.

Sand; in Newt’s cereal bowl and on his plate, in the pockets of his trousers and in the cuffs of his sleeves. Sand in his hair; he showers with it. Sand in his eyes, he cries tears of gold. Sand on his tongue when Thomas kisses him, when it pours from his skin when Thomas touches and trails his fingers down Newt’s body, kisses his neck, the dip below his ribs, his stomach, the jut of his hips, and the small space above his ankle.

Sand; beneath them when they’re fucking, falling from the sky and pulsing in waves beneath their bodies. It coats their skin like a blanket of silk and Newt feels it in his lungs when Thomas is staring up at him, eyes flitting between silver and gold and brown and green, blue, purple, iridescent, reflecting the stars and oceans and mountains themselves. 

Sand; when Thomas is taken away from him, leaving Newt alone in the middle of the floor, cold and naked and confused, when he looks up to spot Thomas on the horizon, standing at the peak of an unreliably large dune, back to Newt as he stares transfixed on the sun.

Thomas; in front of him, then, his eyes growing red and black, patches of skin swelling and turning to grotesque, bulbous sores on his arms, legs, neck, forcing his head to the side, mouth opening to let out a monstrous, inhuman roar. Hands seeking out and grasping at Newt, his touch piping hot, and Newt cannot get away no matter how hard he tries.

Thomas; pale and sick and crying for help. His chest is open and his ribs turn to vines while his organs grow moss, his lungs exploding into a thousand pink butterflies as Newt watches, transfixed, and does nothing. Thomas, whose skin slowly cracks and turns to stone, a sword danging precariously above his head. 

Newt wakes with a gasp in the mornings, hands grasping the sheets and eyes blinking rapidly, dispelling salty tears which sting his eyes, as he waits for his lungs to remember how to function.

“There’s a heart between two lungs,” Thomas says to him, one morning.

“What?” Newt asks, confused.

Thomas shrugs and washes another plate with brown water. “Just something you kept saying in your sleep,” he says.

Snow is a concept of days long past. So, obviously, it stops raining two weeks into winter. Dust storms are infrequent but not unheard of during winter, so, obviously, one hits them hard three weeks into the season. 

The four of them spring into action the moment the wind picks up, their noses catching that familiar scent in the air before the always running radio halts its broadcast of _Keep on the sunny side_ to begin blaring the warning siren. Running through the house collecting everything they need, Newt’s memory is assaulted with the last time they were hit with a storm this fast, the panic and chaos and –

Newt stops that train of thought and runs to collect water. It is quicker, this time, more organised and almost calm. No one gets in each other’s path and everyone knows what to do: Newt on water, Teresa on food, Thomas on protective gear and Brenda on securing the doors and windows.

“It’s getting close,” Thomas says, securing his t-shirt mask. Newt takes his elbow and pulls him toward the basement entry. Brenda grabs the radio, which is now blaring the regulated safety instructions at them and takes it with her into the cellar.

The first thunder strike is heard just as Newt pulls the door shut, and locks it.

Down below, Thomas is doubled over his knees and coughing while Teresa gives him water, rubbing his back in soothing circles. Newt wipes sweat and grime off his forehead and joins them.

The radio sits in the centre of the room, safety instructions chanting in that monotoned mantra. At this point, it is just here out of routine. Thomas begins to cough. It is the kind which begins suddenly and will no doubt end with all the positive probability of a dice roll. Newt crouches beside him, and asks, “Are you okay?”

Thomas nods, and Newt watches him carefully. Teresa glances over from where she and Brenda are checking the room for any new cracks or fissures that may have developed since the basements last use. Her eyes are the colour of midnight in the dim hue of the basement lighting, two orbs blinking out at them over a faded red towel around her mouth.

“Have some more water,” Newt says, but Thomas shakes his head.

“I’m okay,” he says, coughing once more. Teresa and Brenda complete their inspection and come to kneel with Newt and Thomas, water bottles at the ready.

“Well, use your inhaler and –”

Thomas shakes his head some more, on the brink of failing, and Newt’s heart drops through his stomach at the dawning realisation.

“You don’t have it with you.”

“Dude,” Brenda says.

Thomas looks at them pleadingly, and repeats, “I’m okay.”

_Teresa_ doesn’t look okay, Newt notices – she looks like she is ready to strangle Thomas. Newt relates.

It becomes hot in the basement very quickly, and a half-hour into the radio switching over to music after the storm broadcast cuts out Thomas falls asleep beside him. Newt spends another hour or so watching Brenda and Teresa whisper quietly to themselves on the other side of the basement before he, too, nods off.

Newt wakes up with a crick in his neck, a sore back and even sorer ass from the hard, concrete floor. The storm outside has begun to lessen enough so that Newt predicts they will be able to leave the basement in under an hour, allowing time for the toxins in the air to stabilize.

There is a crack in the ceiling right above his head, no more than a fracture, and tiny spider plays hopscotch along the length of it. Newt stares at it until the temperature lowers into something more liveable and Thomas stirs at his side, groaning and making grabby hands at the water bottle by Newt’s knee, hair falling over one eye. Newt carries the radio with him when they leave, locking the basement cellar behind him, emitting a faint click which barely registers to his ears.

It has not rained for three weeks and four days when Newt is out in the crop field – resembling a small garden at this point – and picks up a potato plant leaf only to watch as it crumbles away to dust in the wind. Opposite him, Teresa lifts out of her crouch and frowns down into her basket of tomatoes.

“Damn it,” she says, balancing the basket on one brown knee and scratching at a smudge of dirt on her nose, the approximate size of a thumb. “These aren’t good.”

“How bad?” Newt asks.

“They’re all fucked. Look.” Teresa tilts the basket enough for Newt to be able to peer inside at the small, off-coloured and shrivelled up fruits. Teresa shakes her head and drops the whole basket on the ground. One deformed tomato divorces itself from its family and rolls free, and Newt watches it bounce into the hole he just made for more seeds. Newt sighs deeply and sits back on his heels, wiping at his forehead where sweat has formed despite the chilled temperature. 

“How do yours look?” Teresa asks, coming around to Newt.

“Honestly?” Newt shrugs, picking up a potato and tossing it in the air. The sad spud lands in his hand with a pathetic _thwap!_

Newt says, “Not much better.”

Teresa touches the spine of a potato plant delicately, staring at it as if with some encouragement and positivity it might just grow better, and says, “I think we might be in trouble, Newt.”

Brenda pads into the scene; in each hand she carries two buckets of water, filled to the brim. She drops them at her feet with a huff of relief which scatters the fine hairs that have fallen over her forehead. “What’s happened _now?_”

Thomas is on the porch whittling away at a piece of wood, being forced to “take it easy” after coughing up enough phlegm this morning to make him throw up. He hadn’t been particularly happy about it, and by the looks of him, his mood doesn’t seem to have improved. Now, he glances over at the sound of the buckets hitting the earth and the exasperation in Brenda’s voice.

“The soil’s drained,” Newt says, cupping a handful of dirt in his hand and watching it fall away in dry, light brown chunks. “None of the plants are growing properly.”

In a bazar tandem, both Thomas and Teresa say, “We need mulch,” at the same exact time, Thomas leaning over the railing and shouting the words from the porch.

“What?” Brenda says.

“Back at the –” Teresa pauses, as Thomas scales the steps and comes to stand with the three of them, and starts again, “Back at the community, we had these greenhouses where we would grow all our food. The gardeners all used mulch to enrich the soil and keep the pH balances in check, and stop the desert from sucking all the moisture out.”

“It might not solve all the problems,” Thomas says, “But it’ll be enough to get us through the winter.”

“Okay,” Newt says, massaging his temple, “Where do we get that from?”

“Another farm,” Teresa says, “Or a garden centre. This is prime farmland so there should be some around. Or at least one.”

“Alright,” Brenda nods, “We should go as soon as possible, then.”

“Go?” Thomas frowns.

Brenda spreads her arms out around her, “Look at this place. It’s practically a salt mine. We only have a couple of patches left that are hanging on by sheer luck, at this point. The sooner we get that mulch the better.”

Brenda and Teresa make plans to leave in search of the supplies early the next morning.

“A food run probably would be a bad idea, also,” Teresa suggests, after dinner, when they are all sitting in a circle on the floor of the living room.

Thomas shakes his head, “Don’t push your luck. Collecting bags of mulch that we can’t pay for is one thing, but trying to steal food at the same time?”

“Tom,” Teresa begins, and Newt and Brenda share a look. This is her _Don’t argue with me _voice that they have all heard countless times, especially when Thomas is being particularly finicky with his health. “We’re going to need something to tide us over until the crops regrow. We can’t survive on potato soup and crackers.”

“By we,” Thomas says, frowning, “You mean me.”

Teresa shakes her head, “Thomas, that wasn’t what I –”

“I’m not made of paper, Teresa. I’ve survived this long with this,” Thomas taps his chest, right between his ribs, “and I can handle one fucking winter without you acting like my mother.”

“Tom!” Teresa shouts after him, but Thomas is already walking away. His footsteps echo through the hallway and fade with the slam of the back door.

Brenda clears her throat. “Men,” she says.

Newt moves to get up and follow him but Teresa’s hand on his arm stops him. “No, leave him,” she says, “Let him cool off on his own.” Her voice and eyes are sad as she says this, and Brenda entwines their hands, pulling Teresa’s into her lap and offering an encouraging smile.

Newt glances between them and the back door, conflicted, but in the end decides to heed Teresa’s advice and give Thomas space. Knowing Thomas, he’ll be fine in thirty minutes to an hour, never being able to stay mad at Teresa for very long.

“Right, well,” Brenda begins, “It’s getting late. We better head off to bed so we’re ready for tomorrow.”

When the girls are upstairs getting ready to go to sleep is when Thomas decides to come back inside. His face is stony and measured, and Newt takes one look at him and raises his eyebrows, nodding minutely towards the ceiling. Thomas’ eyes narrow in return and Newt rolls his, and gives up for the night.

In the morning Thomas’ sour expression is lessened into a faint tang, and carries on like that steadily as Teresa and Brenda are readying the car. 

(It is _the_ car, the one no one has used since the night they lost three of their friends in such a short amount of time. Sonya and Harriet having taken the spare, it is the only option. Newt goes near it and feels ghosts vibrating against his skin. He keeps his distance.)

“Me and Newt could go,” Thomas says, hands in his pocket.

“You could,” Brenda begins, slinging a gun into the back seat – one leftover from Marcus’ visit, “except you’d get distracted and stop on the side of the road to fuck, and we’ll all starve to death.”

Teresa snorts into her sleeve, and clovers it with a cough.

Newt and Thomas’ faces turn cohesively red.

Teresa puts her hand on Thomas’ arm, “Don’t worry about it. I’d prefer you to be here.”

“Yeah, I know you would,” Thomas snaps, shaking her off.

Teresa looks less upset now and more disappointed. “Are we doing this again? _Now?_”

Thomas pulls Teresa off to the side to argue, and Newt busies himself with helping Brenda.

Setting up the car, again, feels wrong. Newt’s stomach churns when he helps Brenda with the storage crates, and he know they need the mulch – he knows they are least likely to make it through the winter unscathed without it – part of Newt wants to risk it.

Brenda must sense this in whatever face Newt is making, because she turns to him and says, “I know. But we don’t have any other choice.”

Newt hugs her, then, and it surprises them both. “Please be careful,” he says, not trying to think of the last person he said those words to.

Brenda nods, standing on her toes to rest her chin on his shoulder. “We will. Promise.” 

Thomas and Teresa have seemingly stopped arguing and now look to be once again on mutual ground. “Okay,” Teresa says, “Are we all set?”

Brenda nods, and waves a radio speaker in the air, “Good to go.”

Teresa quickly hugs Thomas and whispers something in his ear that makes him frown but roll his eyes right after, before moving to Newt.

“Take care of him,” she says, low enough for Thomas not to hear, who has moved to talk with Brenda.

“He’ll be in one piece when you get back, Teresa, I promise,” Newt says. He hugs her and tells her to be careful.

Teresa and Brenda load up into the car. From the driver’s side, Brenda taps the side of the door and says, “Okay. We won’t stray out further from the radius that the talkies allow. If all goes well we should be back by tomorrow at the latest.”

“We’ll be checking in every few hours,” Newt says.

Teresa nods, and smiles at Newt and Thomas over Brenda’s shoulder, black hair falling like a curtain around her face. “See you boys soon,” she says.

“See ‘ya,” Thomas says, giving a two fingered wave.

Brenda shouts, “And behave!” out the window as they drive off. The car sends a cool gust of wind their way that flutters Thomas’ hair. 

“Did you know,” Newt begins when they are eating dinner (carrot and potato soup courtesy of Thomas, boiled with a little too much salt – which, granted, being the only form of seasoning they have at their disposal, it is easy to go a little overboard – and slightly undercooked), “This might be the first time we’ve been alone in the house together.”

Thomas pauses with the edge of the spoon in his mouth. “Is it? It is. Huh.” Thomas chews on a carrot, the auditable crunch popping, “Weird. But nice.”

“But nice,” Newt agrees, smiling.

Thomas says, “I think we should redecorate the living room, while they’re gone.”

Newt takes another bite of soup and raises an eyebrow. They checked in with Teresa and Brenda an hour ago. At the time they had yet to find a farm or garden centre, but Teresa apparently spoke to a woman they met at a rest point while recharging the car, and she pointed them in the direction where they could possibly find one.

Newt shallows, and says, “Oh yeah? You don’t like the layout?”

Thomas makes a face and peeks over Newt’s shoulder into the living room. “Nah. The Feng shui,” he says, pronouncing it _Funchway_, “is all wrong.”

Newt turns and glances into the living room, as well, and gives it a good hard think. Eventually, he says, “You’re right. I always thought the sofa should be by the window.”

“Oh yeah,” Thomas says, “And the tables need to be swapped around.”

Newt says, “That bathroom upstairs? It needs an overhaul.”

“Oh, definitely. The kitchen, too. I’m thinking of granite countertops. We should also put a swing outback, and maybe even a treehouse for the kids.” 

“Kids?” Newt says, smile growing, “What kids?”

“Our kids,” Thomas says. “The ones we’ll have in the future. Yeah, really! Just picture it – I’ll be in here cooking –”

“Lord have mercy.”

“– while you’re out the back farming and playing with the kids. The littlest one will be ripping up the carrot leaves, of course, while the other will be all,” Thomas puts on a voice, “_Daaad_, I don’t want to grow vegetables, I want to hang out with my friends. And then you’ll be all,” he clears his throat and does his best impression of Newt’s voice, “Shut up, it builds character. Now get over here and help me with the zucchinis.”

Newt is laughing, “That’s how I sound, is it?”

“Yeah,” Thomas responds, also laughing, “That’s how you sound.”

“Right, okay, so you’re just leaving me to do all the parenting?”

“No, I’m just busy making bread and vegetable casserole.”

Newt hums, “I bet. And where are Teresa and Brenda in this scenario?”

Thomas waves a hand, “Oh, they have their own ranch on the other side of the valley. Berries, maybe. Or grapes. Yeah, grapes. They’ll build their own vineyard from the ground up.”

“While we grow a horticulture empire?”

“Our faces will be on zucchini ads everywhere.”

“Oh!” Newt breathes, “Oh, I can’t _wait_ now. A whole ad? You think a billboard?”

Thomas’ eyes shine, “A whole ass billboard. You’ll be doing this, like, model pose –”

“A _model_ pose!”

“And I’ll be beside you holding a plate of green bread and doing a – like a thumbs up.” Thomas does a thumbs up, drawing his shoulders up to his ears and pressing his lips together in a way which makes Newt rock forward with laugher, “Like that.” 

“_Green_ bread?” Newt asks through hiccups of laughter, “Do you actually know what zucchini bread looks like?”

“Doesn’t matter, babe,” Thomas says, “One day we’ll be rich because of it.”

“Zucchini empire,” Newt says.

“Zucchini empire,” Thomas repeats, lifting his spoon in the air and clinking it against Newt’s in a faux toast.

Newt looks at him for a moment; the gleam in his eyes and the pink flush which has spread on to his cheeks from all the laughter, the messy hair that is beginning to curl below his ears, kissing the top of his jaw, a faint shadow has begun to spread across it. There is an infinite number of stars and worlds floating above their heads right now. There are billions of atoms that have collided, an immeasurable supply of matter that has joined together to create the cosmos that they, themselves, live in. The universe is vast, cold wasteland of unforgiving beauty and, somehow and some way, they have managed to exist in it at the exact same time. 

And that, itself, is the infinite beauty of it all.

Newt leans over and places a small, lingering kiss on Thomas’ mouth, and says, “I love you.”

Thomas smiles. “I love you, too.”

Later, when they are in bed, minds tired and lulling off to sleep, Newt’s tells him, _I think I’ll always love you. Even when we’re different people._

Thomas moans with his cheek pressed into the bowl of the toilet and reaches up to shut it with an angry slam. Newt, with palms splayed out on Thomas’ back, whispers soothingly while rubbing them in slow circles across Thomas’ skin. His mind can’t help but flashback to the last time they were in this exact position; Thomas hunched miserably over a toilet while Newt tried his best to talk him through it, still confused and not quite knowing what to do.

It is different now, of course; there are no working lights in the bathroom besides the torch Newt brought in with him. There is a tiny cockroach crawling up the broken mirror, and Thomas’ skin feels clammier beneath his touch, his ribs and spine more prominent. Newt’s hand unconsciously moves to his own ribs, which he can feel through his clothes at even the slightest press.

Thomas groans and shoves Newt away from him with one elbow, mumbling with a hoarse tenor. “How are you here right now?” he says, “How aren’t you grossed out, yet?” 

“At this point, Tommy,” Newt says, “You’re going to have to do a lot more than this to send me running.”

“What if I were to throw up on you?” Thomas asks, turning to face Newt, his face grey and eyes red.

“Unfortunate,” Newt says. “These are the only pair of trousers without holes in them.”

Newt had been wondering, over time, when all the constant attention would get too much for Thomas. He had been so good and patient with it to far, allowing Newt and Teresa to tell him what to do even during the times when it even felt to Newt like they were babying him.

It comes when Newt is helping him down the stairs. He has one hand around Thomas’ shaky elbow and the other at the small of his back, while Thomas scales the steps with shaky legs. He slips at has to catch himself quick against the banister, nearly missing. The slip sends a quick stab of anxiety to Newt’s heart, and he tightens his grip.

“Careful.”

“I’m fine,” Thomas says.

“You almost slipped.”

“I said I’m _fine_, Newt!” Thomas snaps, and pushes Newt off him, making it the rest of the way down on his own shaky legs.

“Alright then,” Newt says to himself when Thomas is out of sight and goes to work in the garden for the rest of the day. On his way past he hears chatter from the kitchen, and Brenda’s voice over the radio.

Newt reties his hair up after it escapes three times before the band snaps, and he is left sitting in a pile of dry soil, pinching the bridge of his nose and taking deep breathes. He opts to slip the broken elastic into his pocket and deal with it later, and carries on stabbing at the earth with hair fanning around his face. Newt is deeply examining the raspberries and collecting the ones which have made the cut when he hears the tarp in front of the front door part before Thomas’ footsteps thumb on the wooden porch.

“Any update?” Newt asks, without turning around.

“Uhh,” Thomas says, “Yes and no. They managed to find an abandoned motel to crash in for the night after no luck yesterday. But Brenda sounds confident they’ll find what we need at the place they’re heading to.”

“The sooner the better,” Newt says, judging a raspberry before holding it out to Thomas. “Want one?”

Thomas shakes his head, arms folded over his chest. “No, thanks. Newt, hey, uh. I’m sorry about earlier. I shouldn’t have snapped at you.”

Newt is already rising to his feet, shaking his head. “It’s okay, Tommy,” he says, and then, “Open up,” and waits for Thomas to open his mouth before placing a small, pink raspberry on his tongue. Thomas almost doesn’t make a face when he swallows it.

“What does it mean if it actually doesn’t taste that bad?”

Newt shrugs. He pops his own underachieving raspberry in his mouth, and concludes that Thomas isn’t wrong.

They’re lying flat on the ground, staring up at the ceiling as the sunbeams cast overexposed streams of light across the bumps, groves and cracks, when Thomas says, “Do you ever think the Program will switch things up in the future? Like … give the new humans wings or something.”

Newt frowns, “Wings?”

“Or maybe not wings. Those might be annoying.”

“You mean, like, enhanced abilities?”

“Higher sustainability against the elements could be useful.”

“Likely, since they’ll have to survive on a moon. How easy do you think it’ll be to replicate the planet’s gravity and oxygen?”

“Don’t know,” Thomas shrugs, the action rocking Newt’s body just a fraction. “I guess that’s their job to figure out. Wouldn’t it be cool if the second generation of humans didn’t have to sleep every twenty-four hours? Or eat every day.”

“Or shower,” Newt says, “When they have all of it at their disposal? Twenty-four-seven?”

“It’d be useful, Newt! Think of all the resources they could save. Make everything bio-sustainable and degradable.”

“It’s a moon, right? So where will they be throwing all the waste?”

“I …” Thomas trails off.

“Space.”

“Probably.”

“Definitely.” 

Thomas is quiet for a moment. The sunbeams crawl a millimeter before he asks, “You don’t like The Project, do you? Even after you went through it.”

Newt sighs, “Especially after I went through it. And it’s not that I hate it, Tommy, I’m just not … so sure about everything they told us. About Jupiter, and Callisto, and the new world. It’s hard to trust them, after …”

“I get it. I just …” Thomas shrugs again, “I guess I just want to hope, more than anything. We might not be there, but we helped to make it happen. To make things better.”

“Doesn’t that bother you?”

“What?” Thomas asks.

“That – that they did all of _that_ to you, and you won’t even get to see the end result. To be part of the end result.”

“We will be a part of –”

Newt clenches his fists. “Yes, but not really. It won’t be you. It will be someone who looks like you, grown out of a test tube and modified to become some kind of manufactured superhuman.” 

“Does it bother _you?_ Newt?”

“I don’t want to talk about this anymore, Tommy.”

“It bothers you,” Thomas says.

“Yeah. Sure. A little bit.”

“You knew that going in.”

“I knew bullshit going in,” Newt spits, “and so did you. You _fed_ them bullshit.”

“Don’t …” Thomas’ voice stutters, “Don’t do that.”

Newt does not know why he is still talking. With every word that comes out of his mouth, he can virtually feel the hurt coming off Thomas’ body in waves. It is wrong but something inside of him claws at his skin and doesn’t want him to stop.

“Do you remember the name of the guy’s records you stole?” Newt says, “The ones that knocked him out of the Project?”

“Newt.”

“Do you?”

Thomas brings his hands up to his face. “No, I don’t. Are you happy?”

Newt frowns. “No, I’m not fucking happy.”

“You’re never happy.”

“What the fuck is there to be happy about, Tommy?” Newt spits, sitting up so quick that the sudden movement makes Thomas jump. “Seriously? Think about it for two seconds, maybe. And what? It isn’t like you’re a ray of sunshine yourself.”

“I don’t mean – I’m not talking about – Of _course_ – Maybe he was better off, okay?” Thomas says, pulling his hands away from his face with an angry flourish. “He didn’t get his body taken apart and put back together for two weeks, and he sure as hell wasn’t given a life he wasn’t allowed to keep.” Thomas sits up, and rises to his feet. “No expectations. No disappointments.”

Newt blinks after him. “Where are you going?”

“To take a nap,” Thomas throws over his shoulder. “Don’t follow.”

Storm clouds roll in and fade as quickly as they arrived, evaporating into the sky to become nothing but particles once again. Light filters briefly through the scattered remains to shine dubiously over the valley in a patchwork quilt of shadow and light. Newt works out in the garden even though he doesn’t need to, and tries to contact Teresa and Brenda a little over an hour past the argument with Thomas. He receives nothing but white noise on the other end and gathers that they are busy.

Two hours past the argument with Thomas, Newt attempts to distract himself with guessing which song will come over the radio next, but it’s no fun without Teresa to debate with. Three hours post-argument he decides he cannot take it anymore and opts to seek out Thomas where he has closed himself inside one of the bedrooms. 

He finds him lying on his side facing the window and back to the door. It is obvious that Thomas is not asleep, however he gives no indication of having heard Newt enter the room. He counts one, two, three bumps in Thomas spine before crossing the short distance to the bed, and lowers himself down until he is lying chest to back with Thomas.

Newt traces a light hand down his arm to test the waters. He doesn’t pull away, but neither does he lean into the touch, either.

“Hey,” Newt says, “Tommy?”

After a beat, Thomas hums a quiet, “What?”

The hand on Thomas’ arm traces the length of it down to his elbow until they are spooning. Newt presses his lips to the back of his neck; not exactly kissing but simply resting them there, a silent whisper between them.

“I’m sorry,” Newt murmurs against his skin and feels as well as hears Thomas sigh. Their arms sink into the dip between his hip and ribs, and Newt tries not to think about the prominence of his bones.

“Yeah,” Thomas breathes, “Me too.”

They remain in this position for minutes longer, until Newt moves, readjusting his grip and cuddling closer to Thomas who then breathes and little too hard and shuffles an inch away.

“Sorry, I just.” Thomas shuffles more until his arm is out of Newt’s grip, and pulls his knees to in closer to his chest. He does not turn around. “I’m feeling nauseous right now. I don’t know … I just want to lie here for a bit longer. Can we talk about this later?”

Newt pulls his hands back and tries to push down to intrusive stab of hurt that rose up when Thomas pulled away. By his tone it didn’t sound as if he particularly wants to talk about it later.

“Sure. No worries,” Newt murmurs, and leaves him to rest. 

Thomas falls asleep in the bed upstairs and sleeps through dinner. When Newt grows weary, he decides to make up the couch-bed, as usual, so not to disturb Thomas.

Teresa and Brenda do not answer his calls that night.

The radio runs static in the morning. Newt checks on Thomas to make sure he has not swallowed his tongue in his sleep before trying again. Thomas comes downstairs and, while Newt is hunched over a bowl of half of what is left of cereal and Thomas is carrying over the other, leans over to press a quick, apologetic kiss against his temple. They eat their breakfast, fingers intertwined.

Newt works with the raspberries again while Thomas does a sort of rain dance between then the potato plants when his foot tangles around a stray vine and he is forced to hopscotch over the crops so not to crush any of them.

It does not help. The sky remains dusty blue over their heads, surrounding a hazy white sun.

A little before lunch Thomas tries again, and then after lunch he checks the radio a third time, becoming more anxious with each passing minute. By sunset the static noise is loud enough that they both feel it in their bones; the deep, impossible to ignore worry pulsing through their veins in a heavy, sharp temperament is like a medical inducement. 

Thomas is clearly panicking, pacing back and forth between the kitchen and dining room and the living room, stretching the coil until it is pin straight.

“They’ve been gone three days,” he says, “When was the last time you heard from either of them?”

Newt thinks about this for a moment and concludes that it had been yesterday morning when Thomas came outside to tell him they were having trouble finding the supplies. He tells Thomas this, and in result it makes him pace faster. He is wrapped in one of the blankets from upstairs, and it trails behind him like a cape.

“Shit.” Thomas drops the radio to that it lands on the hardwood with a startling _crack _and continues to pace, whispering, “Shit shit shit,” to himself in a mantra.

“Alright, Thomas, just. Don’t panic.”

“Don’t panic? They’ve been gone three days, Newt, and we stopped hearing from them _yesterday morning._ How are you telling me not to panic?” Thomas throws his arms out beside him, “We’re stuck here! We don’t have another car to go out and look for them, I – We don’t even know where they went!”

Newt drops his face into his hands and takes a deep, measured breath. The sound of Thomas beginning to pace once more accompanies the never-ending hiss of the radio. It drives restlessness through his bones and, unsure as to why it is still on, Newt hastily reaches out to flip the switch. The house turns to silence.

Newt begins, “Do we know the direction they –?”

Thomas cuts him off, “No.”

“What do we know?” Newt grinds out between his teeth, hands fisting painfully in his hair.

“We don’t know anything, Newt.” Thomas coughs, once. “We’re stuck –” he coughs again. “We’re sitting and we –” Again. “We don’t –” and again.

The last one sets off a familiar chain reaction, and soon enough Thomas is clutching the hallway arm for support and coughing large, heaving coughs into his fist as the doorway tarp flutters loudly through the house. Newt rushes over to him in an instant, assuming the position of one-hand-on-chest-other-on-upper-back, except Thomas turns away as soon as Newt touches him, and shoves him blindly when he fails to take the first hint.

“Fuck,” Thomas breathes, finally after a minute, his forehead pressed into the corer of the wood. His voice is wet.

Newt curls his hands into fists, and holds them firmly at his sides. “Tommy …”

“No.” Thomas pushes himself off the wall, “No, I’m not giving up yet.”

Newt stares at him, incredulously. “I’m not telling you to give up, Tommy!” he says, “I’m telling you to calm down. They could be lost, they could be resting somewhere, they – they could have lost the bloody radio!”

Thomas blinks at him. “You think they lost the radio. Really?”

“Well, you said it yourself. We don’t know anything.” Newt looks at him. Thomas’ breathing is laboured and his eyes red, and he looks as if he is about to launch into another fit. He desperately wishes he had a paper bag to give him. Instead he says, “Tommy, just calm down and we’ll think about this rationally.”

“Calm down?” Thomas almost shouts, “I can’t calm down where she’s out there, somewhere, and we’re stuck here, and I – I can’t.” Thomas pinches the bridge of his nose, “I can’t explain it to you, Newt.”

Newt, suddenly, feels himself becoming angry. He says, “Why don’t you try and explain it to me, then? It’s later, Tommy.”

Thomas groans so loud it nearly transforms into a growl midway through. “What do you want me to say? What do you want me to tell you?” Thomas begins to pace again, back and forth before the table, eyes wild and full of helplessness, “Do you want me to tell you how we were fourteen fucking years old when I had to marry her because the leader of our community wanted her? After Daniel left her there?”

Thomas spits the name, and Newt vaguely recognises the name used by Teresa, when she had been telling Newt about her brother.

“After he got up and abandoned her and left her without any guardian to say actually no, you fucking pervert, you won’t be taking another fourteen-year-old girl as your seventh wife.” Thomas continues, “Or what about when we had to leave after my mom – after she killed herself because, well, since he couldn’t have Teresa he decided he was going to take _her _instead! How Teresa was the only thing keeping me alive for years. How I wouldn’t be standing here if it wasn’t for her. How I owe her _everything_.”

His voice rings out, clear and piercing in the silence, and knocks Newt back a few paces.

“Gally was right, by the way,” Thomas says, “about the whole Happy Farm thing. They’re all fucking insane. The desert … it does something to you. It changes your brain, I don’t … I can’t describe it. All I know is I’m glad we got out when he did.”

Thomas turns quiet when he finally looks Newt in the eye. Newt’s tongue feels as if it is made of stone, in that moment, and when he tries to make it move, to speak, nothing comes out. He does not know what Thomas sees in his expression, but it banishes the wild, frantic look in his eyes, the one fighting with ghosts, one momentarily trapped in the past like a rat in a maze with no exit.

Newt is all too familiar with that look.

“You must have known,” Thomas says, “I was seventeen when you met me, Newt. How else would I have gotten into the Program? How would they have let me past the front doors?”

And that’s the thing, isn’t it? That is the kicker, the punchline to this whole, long-running, unfunny joke: Newt had known. Thomas would have had to be accepted into the Program at that age somehow, and unlike Sonya, he wouldn’t have had the luxury of an illegal age up. The only logical answer funnelled towards Teresa, entirely and only. The grievers would have scanned Thomas’ number and seen his marital status, and all that would matter from then on was if his spouse was of age, and Teresa had been. 

Newt does not answer, or say anything, or move. Thomas drops his eyes to the floor, head ducking low so that his hair falls to conceal his face.

Newt relaxes his fists and uncurls his fingers only when Thomas has dragged himself and the radio out on to the front porch, and is shocked to find his fingernails coming back red. Four crescent-shaped marks form an orderly march along Newt’s heartline, and Thomas’ voice intermixes with white noise on the cool winter wind. 

There is a sickness in Newt’s bones that is tugging at his limbs and slithering around his bloodstream, building a cage around his heart that everyday grows a little stronger. It began when those gunshots rang out over the valley, or earlier when Minho slipped away right before his eyes, or earlier, when Winston left them. Or earlier than that, when WCKD took them away from their happy ever after, or earlier when the donation process began.

They did something. They took something they weren’t supposed to, something vital, Newt knows it, and now they’ve left him without an idea or hope or even a map to retrieve it. They took what he had and put something else in its place; a foreign toxin, its spreads like a disease and holds his mind, his body and his emotions captive.

(Or maybe it wasn’t WCKD it all. Maybe it was earlier, before The Program, before Minho, when gunshots rang and his mother screamed in his ear and he cried, cried, cried.)

Newt’s legs carry him outside before he realises it is happening. Thomas sits on the top step, blanket rippling out beside him like wings. He speaks into the radio quietly, asking if anyone can hear him.

No one answers.

Cautiously, Newt moves forward until he is standing behind Thomas, and softly calls his out his name. Thomas stops asking Teresa and Brenda if they can hear him and if they are there, the line of his shoulders tenses, back straightening out, and he does not turn toward Newt.

“Tommy?” Newt tries again, and when Thomas stands the wind pushes the blanket outwards, one of the corners kissing the back of Newt’s hand, and tangles around Thomas’ body like a parachute made of silk.

Dry tears coat his cheeks when he finally turns to face Newt but his expression, overall, is blank and drained of all emotion. He tells Newt, “They aren’t coming back.”

Thomas drops the radio on the porch and walks away without another word. 

It takes Newt another three days until he finally allows himself to believe it.

–

Thomas faces Newt in the bed, this time. They are lying close to one another, chest to chest, foreheads pressed together, thighs touching and ankles dipping over and under, interlocked. The sun has set, and warm candlelight bathes the room in orange. Shadows lick their bodies wherever the light does not kiss, covering them in a whisper-thin blanket. Thomas’ eyelids are closed, and Newt traces the jagged line of shadows on his cheeks with the very tip of his finger with a ghostly soft touch.

When Newt’s finger dips into the crease between his nose and cheek, Newt tells him, “I think there’s something … wrong inside of me. Think there has been for a while. I didn’t cry when Minho died.”

Thomas opens his eyes, and Newt watches with an out of body transfixion as the flames dance among his irises. His eyebrows furrow, and Newt traces those, too. “But you did.”

Newt shakes his head. “I didn’t. I wanted to. I felt it rising up inside of me, but then I just … couldn’t. I don’t know if I remember how to, Tommy.” 

Thomas’ eyes shine a sunburnt orange in the dim light of the room, reminding Newt of vibrant azalea flowers. They always were his mother’s favourites.

It has not rained for one month and two weeks.

Thomas says what they have will be enough to get them through the winter. Newt has his doubts but does not voice them. He wants to believe that they will, too. 

It has not rained for two months when the next dust storm hits and damages the water lines. The pipes surrounding the property are uplifted, and within a day their running water is cut. There is no spring or water source for miles. Most of the natural rivers and lakes in the surrounding area have dried up long ago, and now only craters remain in their place. They collect what they can by hand from the water tank around the side until that, too, is empty.

Their only hope is rain. 

It has not rained for two months and ten days when Thomas suggests hiking over to the Colorado river. It is almost a day’s travel on foot, and together they argue about the dangers of leaving versus staying put and allowing fate to do with them what it will. Newt is hesitant and scared not for himself, but of the uncertainty that they will pass into the moment they leave the farm. 

In the end, the pros outweigh the cons as it is, as of right now it is, the only option that they have. Newt packs clothes while Thomas collects the remainder of the food and water they have; protective cloth for their faces, should another dust storm hit while they are travelling. Newt shivers at the mere thought of it, but they have to be realistically prepared for anything.

Newt watches Thomas change his clothes. The outline of his ribs when he pulls the old, dirty t-shirt up over his head to replace it with one with longer sleeves is prominent, and his skin is an ashy, pale shade with spots of purple or yellowing bruises scattered around the space of his torso. He looks almost nothing like the bronze-skinned boy Newt had met all those months ago, skinny and frail and perpetually exhausted.

Newt is aware that he, too, has changed tremendously. His cheeks are sunken when he looks in the mirror, deep purple rims below his eyes, with stubble, and hair now skimming the tops of his shoulders when he lets it out, thin and rough like hay. 

Thomas turns and catches him staring. He smiles at Newt while ruffling his hair, and Newt smiles back. It is at that moment that he truly believes everything will be okay.

The morning they are due to leave Thomas falls to his knees in the hallway and throws up an impossible amount of blood, and immediately passes out. Newt spends the next few minutes kneeling at his side, blood and sick seeping into the fabric at his knees, shaking Thomas’ shoulders and shouting so loud he feels as if his vocal chords are ripping in two. 

The rest of him quite nearly also rips in two when Newt lifts Thomas into his arms and feels no beat of his heart when he places a hand on Thomas’ chest. He presses down on Thomas’ chest hard enough that he worries the bones will break at his touch until Thomas’ chest judders and he lifts his chin and coughs, and a sob rips itself out of Newt’s throat.

Newt holds him tight against him with trembling arms, pressing their foreheads together and rocking helplessly on the floor.

“Shhh,” he whispers, patting Thomas on the back as he continues to cough, comforting him through it, as tears fall from his cheeks and fall into Thomas’ hair. “You’re okay. I’ve got you, you’re okay.” 

Newt cleans the hallway. Thomas attempts to help but Newt banishes him to bed sternly, and Thomas goes with pressed lips and guilty eyes which feels like a sharp knife across Newt’s skin. Newt manages to spare an ounce of water to help as he scrubs the floors with an old bath towel, and after he is done Newt strips out of his clothes, throws them into the rust and brown stained tub, and crawls into bed with Thomas. He settles into the sheets with a sigh that fills his entire body, head to toe, and curls himself around Thomas – arms, legs, toes, body, and heart. 

The cold lack of beat Newt felt when he’d touched his chest haunts him every time he closes his eyes.

It has not rained in two months and twenty-two days. Newt uses the last of the water for the last of the plants and saves what he can for them. They hold on. They are _holding_ on, valiant and stubborn, and Newt cannot be prouder.

Around him the world turns brown.

The land is dying, and so are they.

The hallucinations begin on day three without water. Their meals for the day are small, dry berries, once in the morning and another at night. Newt can barely lift his head from the pillow anymore. Thomas is beside him, still and quiet. His chest lifts minimally in ragged breaths. Newt is on his back, eyes heavy and lidded, lips and tongue like sandpaper. His throat burns when he breathes, and his body aches. Newt does not feel like a person anymore – he feels dry, and wasted, and empty shell of pain.

The ghostly voices wash over him from all angles. 

_Idiot_, it whispers, _Foolish boy_.

Newt groans, shaking his head. No. No, he isn’t.

_Just a child_, it says again. _You never listened. Not once. Never listened to anyone. _

Newt’s eyes flutter open weakly. Above him a figure fades in and out of reality. She is crouched above his chest and staring down at him with a familiar look of content. Familiar, too familiar.

Newt forces his eyes open more as she is saying, _Never knew how to survive. You needed us. Never listened … Never listened._

Newt sees his mother’s face glaring down at him, staring with cold, ice white eyes. Blood coats the left side of her face and drips on to Newt’s forehead. He groans and curls into Thomas, weakly pulling him closer, and shakes her away.

She reappears by the window. She traces her finger into the dirty glass, and blood and grime begin to spell out Newt’s number.

_You gave it up_, his mother whispers, _You gave it up. Was everything we did for nothing?_

“No,” Newt says, out loud this time. “No, no, no.”

_Was this worth it?_ A new voice asks, and Newt turns to see his father sitting in a chair in the corner. The chair does not belong to this room, he knows it. It is the one that remains in the other bedroom. The one they have not touched since that day. The room Minho died in.

_Was all of this worth it?_ His father asks, waving a pale, ghostly hand at Thomas, _Was he worth it?_

“Yes,” Newt breathes, positioning his body over Thomas’ protectively. “Yes, it was. It was worth it. He is worth it.”

_You did nothing,_ his mother says again, _You just sat by and watched, and did nothing._

Her _nothing_ echoes in Newt’s head. “I was a child,” Newt says between gritted teeth. The _nothing, nothing, nothing_ plays on. “I couldn’t have done anything.”

_You didn’t _want_ to do anything_, his father tells him, voice loud in his ears, in his skull, reverberating his bones. _You were happy when they came._

Newt wakes to the sound of Thomas’ voice calling his name, and the _nothing _fades off into nonexistence. “Newt,” he is saying, voice hoarse and incomplete, “Newt, do you hear that?”

Newt blinks, and he listens. He banishes his parents from his mind and listens. It is faint but growing louder: tapping against the windowpane, and wind jostling it in its frame.

Rain. 

It is raining.

The wind picks up, and the rain comes down harder. Newt and Thomas crawl from their bed, and stumble downstairs like a pair of old goats, until finally they burst through the door and out into the fresh, wet air. They collapse in a naked heap at the foot of the stairs, not a care to the mud, and allow the rain to wash over them, mouths open to catch spare drops.

Thomas is laughing – or he could be crying, it is very hard for Newt to tell – and spreads his arms out like a pair of angel’s wings, eyes closed and content. “Newt,” he says. Rain falls on to his lips as he speaks, “Newt, it’s raining.”

“It’s raining,” Newt agrees, quiet and unbelieving, fingers digging into the mud, feeling it under his fingernails, a grounding pleasure. There, as the water cleanses his body and slowly brings them both back to life, Newt says, “Tommy. I hated them.”

Newt continues to stare at the grey clouds above them, blinking against the sting of the raindrops falling into his eyes, spilling down the side of his head like tears. He feels numb, his heartbeat too fast in his chest. He digs his fingers deeper into the mud.

“What?” Thomas asks, confusion contaminating his voice.

“I hated them, Tommy. My parents. They were … bad people. They stole, and lied, and hated everyone but each other. They never cared about me, they. They hurt me and I … I think I wanted them to die. I didn’t try and help when the Grievers came and took them away. I was _glad_.”

Thomas pulls him close, and Newt doesn’t realise he is crying until his sobs are shaking Thomas’ body, as he holds him to his chest.

After the adrenalin kicks in and reminds them to carry buckets outside to collect all the water that they possibly can before the storm passes, Newt cooks some potatoes. It uses up a decent portion of their supply of candles to do so, but Newt decides it is worth it. Thomas is still hardly strong enough to stand on his own two feet, so he sits by the table and watches Newt stir their dinner of the week with lidded, sleepy eyes.

Newt casts a glance over at him, at his elbows on the table and his chin in his hands. The look in Thomas’ eyes is one Newt has seen many times before but never ceases to send a thrill of excitement through him. The thought of leaving this place with Thomas is something that swims in the back of his mind daily. Maybe, now that the rain is back, they will both be able to gain enough strength to venture out and find a new home. 

Thomas coughs into his hand, stifling them so they reverb back into his body, his shoulders quaking with the effort, and Newt frowns.

“Stop doing that,” he says, bringing the plates of potatoes to the table (three each. It’s all they can manage today).

Newt wonders, with a blunt jab to the chest, what it means that Thomas can’t even flush anymore. He misses the pink dots colouring his cheeks, sometimes spreading to his ears and down his neck. He enjoyed touching it, tracing its journey with the pad of his finger, sometimes veering off course and running his fingertip over his shoulder, and feeling the outline of Thomas’ number through his clothes.

He supposes that will also be something to regain.

“Sorry,” Thomas says, accepting his plate, “I know it’s annoying.”

Newt frowns, “No. I meant stop holding it in. It’s not good for you to do.”

For a moment Thomas looks as if he wishes to reply, put instead presses his lips and slowly digs into his unseasoned potatoes with a blunt fork.

The radio plays perpetually in the background, proving that it is the only thing in this house that works anymore. They have officially run out of potatoes and are on the last of the berries, and the ground does not look like it will grow anymore, aside from one raspberry bush, which has been their saving grace and symbol of hope, until it, too, begins to whither.

Newt doesn’t mean for it to come out of his mouth; it takes him by surprise, too. He is tired, and his lips move on their own accord, his weary mind sending words down through them without a thought or care in the matter.

“What if …” he begins, “What if we just stopped. What if we just let it happen how it’s supposed to happen?”

Thomas looks at him so startled Newt would think that in his malnutrition and dehydration he has somehow managed to grow a new head to feed.

“What?” Thomas says, eyes widening for a moment before narrowing, accusing. He grips the mantle for support. “You mean … You’re talking about dying?”

Newt takes a deep breath and joins his hands before him on his lap. He feels as if he is making a plea to the jury. “Don’t you ever think that all this has happened for a reason? The drought, our food source dying, the fact that we have no means to leave. Don’t you just think maybe … it’s meant to be like that?”

“So, you just what?” Thomas says, “You just want to lie down and die, Newt? Fucking kill yourself?”

The words sting more than he expected they would. Newt closes his eyes, and says, “We’re already dying, Tommy.”

Thomas barks a cold, humourless laugh. “_We’re_ dying? I’ve been dying since the day I was born, Newt!”

Newt finds himself flinching at the bout of strength in Thomas’ voice. “I didn’t mean –”

“No, no no. I know what you meant. But you know what?” Thomas looks at Newt, dead in the eye, and tells him, “I wasn’t supposed to make it past my seventeenth birthday. Did you know that? I’ve carried that with me my whole life.”

Thomas pauses. He taps his fingers three times on the mantle, frowning deeply, and continues, “I wouldn’t have had a chance in hell if it wasn’t for WCKD. That house, for all it was, saved me. And for that reason – and that reason _only_ – I decide when it is I die. Okay? Not the winter, not the land or the fucking earth. Certainly not fate. _Me_.”

Newt makes up the old couch bed that night. When he is settled, tucked in with the covers pulled up to his chin, staring up at the cracked ceiling and contemplating the universe, Thomas’ form appears beside him in the darkness.

“I’m sorry,” he says, as Newt sits up. “I didn’t mean to … I don’t want you to want to die.”

Newt finds his hand in the darkness and, with some maneuvering, pulls Thomas in to lie on top of him, his head on Newt’s chest and Newt’s ankles caught between his. They sleep together like this tonight, curled around each other like the old days when Newt felt in love and without a care in the world.

“Do you think it’ll be beautiful?” Thomas says, after the thousandth time Newt has told him to be quiet and preserve his strength, before giving up and lying beside him in the bed. “Up there?”

_It will be nothing_, Newt wants to say. A floating rock in space. Or it will be perfect, a life that isn’t theirs.

“I don’t know,” is what Newt settles with. Beside him, Thomas sighs.

“Do you think we’ll know each other?” he asks, “Do you think we’ll meet? The new us.”

_No_, Newt thinks. They won’t know each other. They might very well be born fifty years apart on opposite ends of the colony. Maybe they’ll cross paths one day, make eye contact and nod to each other in passing, and then go about their separate lives where they are in love different people, if at all.

“Maybe,” he says out loud.

Newt wonders if the future incarnation of himself, whoever he will be, will ever know he outlived his predecessor at the ripe old age of nineteen, just barley teetering on to twenty.

He won’t. He will never know anything about Newt.

He will know nothing. 

He will never know Thomas, or Minho, or Teresa and Winston and Sonya, Brenda and Jeff, Harriet, Frypan and Gally like Newt knew them. He will carry on in his obliviousness, and live happily.

Newt sighs. “Maybe not.”

“I’d like to think we will.”

“It’d be nice.” Unrealistic. “Maybe we will. You never know.” _Unrealistic_. Just hopeful words and prayers.

Thomas begins, “Do you think –”

“Tommy,” Newt says, “I’m really tired, and you need to rest. We’ll talk about this in the morning.”

Thomas is quiet for a moment, before he closes his eyes and breathes deeply. “Okay,” he murmurs, “It’s always darkest before the dawn. My mom used to say that.”

Newt places a lingering kiss on Thomas’s cheek before pressing his face into the warm skin between Thomas’ neck and shoulder. That night he dreams of scorpion statues and a distant, peaceful moon where he watches a meteor shower with Thomas by his side, and they are happy. The scorpions surround Newt and stare at him with cold, metal eyes and scream deafeningly in his ears, and Newt wakes up with a start, heart hammering, eyelashes wet.

He leans down carefully and places his hand on Thomas’ arm, tugging the blankets in to protect against the chill and keep him warm. “Tommy,” Newt whispers, “Promise me … Promise you’ll look for me. Promise you’ll find me on that big floating rock in space.”

Thomas does not speak or move, fast asleep. 

The radio plays perpetually in the background. Reruns of old broadcasts which played over the air long before the world went to shit, before Hard Rock was Hard Rock, before the time of dust storms and WCKD. Newt would listen to them on loop so frequently back at the facility that he is now able to pick out what the specific announcer will say, or comment on, or play. In one particular broadcast, the announcer’s name is Lucky Joe, and he prefers classic southern jams. The kinds that play when Newt closes his eyes and pictures a field of neatly cut grass, small cottage houses on either side and light strung from roof to roof in a zig-zag pattern. He sees fireflies, and people dancing among them, women with dresses that ripple outward from their bodies like silk waves.

Lucky Joe likes to say this one line – or, rather, he said it once, and Newt has heard it more times than he can count on both hands: “On this fine, sunny day we all celebrate the sixty-seventh anniversary of the day man first walked on the moon. The day history was truly made! May the future continue to be bright, and full of wonder and adventure.”

He plays a song, then, and Newt recognises it within the first few bars.

“Tommy,” he says, “Will you do something with me?”

Thomas looks up from his book, and stares at Newt as he stands whilst pulling at Thomas’ wrist to join him. “What is it?”

“Dance with me,” Newt says.

“Why?”

“Just … dance with me.”

They end up positioned with both of Thomas’ arms looped around Newt’s neck, and Newt holding tight on to him around the waist, supporting his weight to keep him from falling. Newt gently rocks them side to side, turning in a slow circle, and the singer’s jaw, musical voice washes over them during their delimited waltz. 

Thomas’ chin rests on Newt’s shoulder, and Newt sighs in content with his face pressed into Thomas’ hair. He feels it when Thomas’ breath catches in his throat when he, ultimately, recognises the song.

“This was playing in my room. That day that you helped me try and walk,” Thomas whispers.

“It felt like we were dancing,” Newt adds, pressing a small kiss to the shell of Thomas’ ear, peeking out from his hair.

“I thought so, too,” Thomas says. “But really it was just an excuse for me to drape myself all over you.”

Newt laughs, quietly, “I knew it.”

“You went along with it.”

“You bet I did.”

“I saw you in the beginning,” Thomas says, tone held back, almost like he is admitting a deep secret. “You didn’t see me, but we were on the same bus out to Nevada to take us to the gates of the Callisto Project. Me and Teresa sat in the back, and you were up towards the front with Minho. They were passing around packets of crackers and drinks, and you spilled the soda all over yourself when the bus went over a speed bump. Minho burst out laughing, and you went all red.” Thomas pauses, and Newt can hear the smile in his voice when he says, “You were the most gorgeous thing I’d ever seen.” 

Newt pulls back enough to be able to look Thomas in the face. Thomas’ words have just sent him back in time so vividly he can almost taste the soda on his lips, feel the acidic bubbles on his tongue. He can hear Minho’s laughter in his ear. He could almost be in that moment. He could tell his past self to look back.

Tomorrow they will try again. Tomorrow they will wake up, they will dress with shaky hands and harrowed breaths, and they will head for the Colorado river as they said they would. Newt will pack the bag and Thomas will busy himself with the protective gear, stopping to plant a small, chap-lipped kiss on the tip of Newt’s nose before he ties the scarf around Newt’s face. It will be hard, that he has no doubts of. It might possibly kill them.

But they will try.

Outside the wind picks on. Over the horizon, the sun is readying itself to make its first appearance for the day and, somewhere up there, Jupiter’s faint glow is shining down on them. Newt closes his eyes and rests his head on Thomas’ shoulder, and feels a sense of calm settle over him that he has not felt in months.

They will try tomorrow.

For now; they dance.

*

_ I will go if you ask me to_ _. I will stay if you dare. And if I go, I'm goin' crazy.  
Let my darlin' take me there._

**Author's Note:**

> _If I go, I'm Going_, by Gregory Alan Isakov is the song they listen to when they dance at the end, and you can find it [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3gnxO8bUxQ).
> 
> I mention so many songs in this fic I should probably make a playlist of them all. Maybe that'll be a fun activity for the future. I'll keep you posted. 
> 
> Okay *claps hands*. Wow! What a journey! Thank you SO so much to everyone who has stuck through to the end, I cannot tell you how much it means to me. Ily. 
> 
> You are most welcome to come yell with me - or _at_ me, whichever you prefer - on [tumblr](http://singt0me.tumblr.com/) here.


End file.
